Fences

Wire tight posts in deep

Good fences good neighbors make

Friends, maybe not

Copyright 2011 Shanyn Silinski

http://www.apicturespeakschallenge.com/2011/09/picture-speaks-4.html

Fall Evening '11

The sun setting on a lovely fall day.

I love the sun shining through the leaves.

My golden girls, Feathers and Anna.

Wow, that is one fast 'Houla dog!

She's my golden girl, Feathers.

The sun, golden, against the storm clouds.

The easiest way to check the fence!

Enjoying the last sunbeams of summer.

What do you mean you won't throw my stick?

Golden sunshine against storm clouds.

He Paints

Black

he paints

colors he dabbles

round bodies eyes and smiles

the people are happy or mad never alone

I love seeing our family painted, bold strokes, by six year old hands

Thumbs up, ball caps, lopsided hearts, his family

we live in his world

painted by him

with love

colored

2011 Copyright Shanyn Silinski

http://www.apicturespeakschallenge.com/

This week's challenge: Photography: Macro, Poetry: Fibonacci

Ode to Yellow

I love watching the finches find the sunflowers

their yellow and black on the green and yellow

their simple joy of finding seeds and chasing bees

hiding just a bit as the flowers dip down from their foraging

sometimes one, many times two or three feasting

impatient for the seeds to dry they steal from still blooming heads

nothing makes me smile like sunflowers

fall arrived today and my flowers bowed their heads low

no more sunflowers now until next spring. I'll miss them so.

http://www.apicturespeakschallenge.com/ 

Poem: Grandma's Stuck

Magpie Tales Prompt

It was new once, back in the 50's
Grandpa bought it for real cash,
folded bills out of a canvas wallet.

Bright blue paint, rounded fenders.
Big black tires biting the dirt road.
Arm out the open window, he smiles.

Gone are the days of a wagon and team.
The old geldings resting three legged in
the back pasture under the poplars.

Grandma met him at the front door.
Hands drying on her pressed apron,
looking in wonder at the new truck.

He takes her hands, looks her in the eye,
"Honey you are gonna drive her for me,
we have to harvest the wheat this week."

She nods, knowing the boys are busy
running the threshing machine she fears.
She won't look at it, remembering that day.

Her childhood blotted out in blood as her
dad died there, bleeding on the straw.
Farm wife, yes, farming wife never.

She never went to the fields, unless
she was bringing food to leave on the wagon.
She never looked, she knew she'd still see.

He takes her by the hand, and lifts her up.
She's light as a feather, and trembling so.
The truck is so big! Huge. New. Loud.

The gear knob seems so dirty in her hand,
the steering wheel big and stiffly turning.
Clutch deep down, brakes hard and tight.

"Check your mirrors. Don't get stuck."
He reminds her, fearing the worst.
She doesn't drive, and he knows it.

"Follow me to the field, it's easy."
Whine, growl, clunk - she stalls it flat.
It roars to life again, rumbling away.

She idles in first gear, fearing to shift.
She grips the wheel so tight, her hands ache.
The field looms a waving gold killer.

Grandma is stuck. Stuck in the past.
Stuck in this truck. Stuck on the farm.
Stuck because she loves him more.

The truck rolls to a stop, rumbling,
he looks back and sees her tears.
Washing her face, her eyes a blur.

Suddenly the harvest is forgotten.
He remembers too, he was a boy then.
The blood on the wheat, the screams.

The door opens, and he pulls her out.
He understands and holds her close.
She leans, moans and then pulls back.

"We've got a field to get done," she whispers.
"And the bread is rising. I don't have all day."
Hand in hand they stay a moment longer.

Nodding, he knows, and they pull together
as they always did, always do, and the job
got done. Again. The tears dried. Again.

The rough voices and work worn hands of farmers and farming wives seldom reveal their tender hearts for the land, their crops and their animals.  They rarely let you in to their hurts and hopes. But every table that bears a meal, ever full cupboard or fridge is because of their love, their passion, their sweat and tears.  I dedicate this poem to Lester, Nellie, Albert, Walter and Effie and all those who came before and who come after that feed us. SJS

What Luck!?

They say the success of a rain dance has a lot to do with timing.
Corn rustled with dried, almost dead, leaves.
Cobs rattled together, too small and too dry.
Grasses crunch, crunched underfoot
and in the mouths of the animals who chewed.

I salvaged the tomatoes with a daily hosing.
The garden a round patch of green, an island.
Frogs moved into the yard, the pond, the trees.
Croaking for every drop of water they found.

Forecasts watched, science more like lucky bones.
Knuckles of a goat on dusty circles predict the same.
Clouds mean rain, well really! Sun is too hot. Duh.
Black hoses hold steaming hot water, enough to bathe.

Dogs and cows pant in the heat, no relief.
Cats seek questionable shade and heave.
Frogs and dogs share the pond, wet and cool.
Hummingbirds drain the nectar, not enough flowers.

World shakes, floods rise and fall back, smoke rises
and fires edge closer to the farms. She's angry
the old ones sagely say, our mother the Earth,
she is holding a hissy fit in weather and watch out!

I don't know about all that, but I do know this.
The happy sounds of thankful baby birds
singing in the rain, of dogs splashing, cows slurping.
Horses rolling in genuine muddy pastures.

It could be the edges of the hurricane's rain
come to visit the prairie's dry soils.
The rain song of a six years old boy worked,
he is sure. The rain came, the toads hopped.

The timing is critical, to be sure, in rain dances.
The same is true for so much other 'luck'.
Maybe it is not 'luck' after all but God having
a laugh at us trying to do His job of running things.
 
2011 Copyright Shanyn Silinski