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Open Poetry #46
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Cpat Hair
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Posts 11793


0 posted 2010-10-29 10:53 AM


I’d taken 7 south out of Harrison
Figured to pick up 16 and head back east
Now that the trailer was empty
And I was in need of windshield time
As I sorted out how it came to be
Between Beth and me those years ago

I’d read her notes again
Then pursued the pages of the old leather
Seeing what I already knew was there
Of how it felt to love someone you couldn’t have
Except as a passing word or two and some touch
That might be shared when with curtains pulled
The want was written with fingertips
Along the lines age and traveling so many roads
Had left behind

I didn’t get far

The old truck and I decided to stop along the Buffalo
The truck to cool off while I begged water
From a wizened old fellow who ran a store
That looked more closed than opened
Even with a couple of cars sitting outside

Old man introduced himself as Ted
But said most people called him Ash seeing as how
He has once been a logger and back about ‘69
He’d helped fight the wildfire that burned for weeks
And took more than twelve thousand acres as well as his shack
Nothing more than ashes to blow about

He scrounged up a couple of gallon milk jugs and filled them up
Then invited me to sit on the porch with him and have a cup of joe
Since I wouldn’t be able to open the radiator cap until
The old truck had cooled for an hour or two

“No need to rush” he said slow

We sipped the black from chipped cups
And he spun tales about the flood
That reached the bottom of the 7 bridge
And how they had found tin from the old homesteads
Bent crazy like around the tops of trees
Then how there were some things and people
They never found


“You got a woman?” he asked
as the conversation about weather, cows, floods, and fires
had run its course and left a void to fill

Before I could answer
He rattled a gravel on tin laugh and answered his own question
“Not that you’re with.”

I just grinned and took a drink filtering the grounds with my teeth
Then giving up and swallowed them as he reached over with the pot
To fill my cup again

“Her name is Beth” I said along with a nod of thanks
and we both sat quiet
watching an old grey worry an acorn
as it sat on the limb of a white oak between the road
and where we were

“Well,” he began after the grey had twitched its tail
and scurried up the trunk out of sight
“You keep on dreaming son”
“you never know when the river will flood
and bring down to where you are those things
You never thought you’d see”

He ambled inside and I heard the slicer turn on
And in a few he came out with a bundle of wax paper
That he handed to me and grinned
“For the road” he said adding
“Your old truck ought to be cooled down some now”

I shook his hand then picked up the gallon jugs
And headed back to the truck
Wondering if the rain would indeed bring a flood
That might bring to me what I thought
I’d never have
Of her

© Copyright 2010 Cpat Hair - All Rights Reserved
s1nfully_1nn0c3nt
Senior Member
since 2003-10-26
Posts 1105
Watertown, NY
1 posted 2010-10-29 11:05 AM


This is a wonderful story, I can just picture two men sitting on the porch sipping coffee and chatting. Enjoyed.

-Trina.

"To decieve ones self, is truly a grueling battle. One which we're destined to lose."

Cpat Hair
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Member Patricius
since 2001-06-05
Posts 11793

2 posted 2010-10-29 11:11 AM


Thanks Ms Trina... part of a much longer set of storied poems written with the intent of telling a larger story of sorts.
Glad you could wade through it and enjoy.

Dark Stranger
Member Patricius
since 2001-03-19
Posts 13631
West Coast
3 posted 2010-10-29 11:17 AM


so the slicer got part of a slow grey?  kewl stuff capt..I have leaned a few kickstands for the same kind of conversation and even the same bad coffee..
Amaryllis
Senior Member
since 2010-05-20
Posts 1306
Mi now
4 posted 2010-10-29 11:20 AM


Wonderful slice, Cpat... smokey and slow, and full of patient wisdom. Thanks for sharing these with us...  
Best~
Amaryllis

BluesSerenade
Member Patricius
since 2001-10-23
Posts 10549
By the Seaside
5 posted 2010-10-29 11:23 AM


You should write a novel, you pay such close attention to every detail and take your readers down a long and winding road
that seems so familiar and just as picturesque as I remember.


You capture so much and captivate me with your story telling.

Just fabulous, truly.

Cpat Hair
Deputy Moderator 1 Tour
Member Patricius
since 2001-06-05
Posts 11793

6 posted 2010-10-29 11:24 AM


Brother Dark... have to use a slicer set pretty thin on them old greys.. they can be tough to chew.

pleased you found something in the ramble you could relate to...

Eusta B. Mae
Senior Member
since 2010-05-03
Posts 903

7 posted 2010-10-29 11:24 AM


So this is just a teaser? Oh Man! Thanks alot...this was a great story..I could almost smell the coffee. ebm
ethome
Member Patricius
since 2000-05-14
Posts 11858
New Brunswick Canada
8 posted 2010-10-29 11:26 AM


Nice ramble. Got the lifetime story mellows with it and as always the love reflections.

Some old folks got their inner conscious routines down to a science don't they? Somehow you just don't even want to argue with them ever....It's just too cool!

Loved it!

Eric  


Cpat Hair
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9 posted 2010-10-29 11:26 AM


Ms Amaryllis
  pleased you dropped in... the old fellow probably still has the same bad coffee and would spin a better yarn than me. If you get over that way drop in, I am sure he'd enjoy your company


Cpat Hair
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Member Patricius
since 2001-06-05
Posts 11793

10 posted 2010-10-29 11:28 AM


Ms Blues... as always I am honored to see your words left on my scribbles...
and pleased I could captivate any part of you with my words

thank you

Cpat Hair
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Member Patricius
since 2001-06-05
Posts 11793

11 posted 2010-10-29 11:30 AM


Ms EBM.. part of the Boston Mountain series, the beginning goes back to Iambe, morphs into a series about Lacey, and takes up again when I returned to the blue pages..
the earlier ones are around, so not a teaser as much as just another in a series of rambles

thanks for you eyes and the nice words ma'am

Cpat Hair
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Member Patricius
since 2001-06-05
Posts 11793

12 posted 2010-10-29 11:32 AM


Eric,
thanks m'friend... rambles are something I enjoy, often at the expense of the reader's patience I fear..lol..

appreciate you dropping in....

JerryPat
Senior Member
since 2010-10-30
Posts 1991
Louisiana/America
13 posted 2010-10-30 09:57 PM


Great prose here, Cpat Hair. I was involved with the two men's conversation from the get-go and the more I read the deeper I was there. It doesn't take a road warrior to understand the poem, but it does help, I'd say. I have a truckers poem I guess I'll share with the board before I call it a day. Good stuff.

. . . and the Raven said, %!~#&(&#!$!

Balladeer
Administrator
Member Empyrean
since 1999-06-05
Posts 25505
Ft. Lauderdale, Fl USA
14 posted 2010-10-30 10:25 PM


As a fellow who knows those small towns, the old man and his homespun advice, the stores looking more closed than open and the bad coffee....I can relate and savor the flavor of the piece. Very nice work, sir...
Cpat Hair
Deputy Moderator 1 Tour
Member Patricius
since 2001-06-05
Posts 11793

15 posted 2010-10-31 12:49 PM


JP... thanks for the read and your kind words.
they are appreciated

Cpat Hair
Deputy Moderator 1 Tour
Member Patricius
since 2001-06-05
Posts 11793

16 posted 2010-10-31 12:50 PM


Mr 'Deer.. always a pleasure to find your words left on some scribble of mine.
glad there was something in this you could relate to


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