EVERYTHING WAS REAL

Mama’s garden is a collage of

indelibles that are greater than the

sum of my parts. They are the

stones of which I’m made.

Her tiny house sat alone at the end

of a gravel drive and lives today

buried in every cell of my bones.

I always knew and relished it all.

“Don’t let that screen door slam!

You’re out there, stay out there!”

And three hundred sixty degrees

of adventure laughed and ran

across the yard to the brown dirt

Papa had plowed with Queenie,

his patient mule, hung with harness

and long reins, to lumber along.

Fist sized clods of dirt made war

an easy outlet on week-end visits,

whiz! Thump! Hey,! OW! And back

at you with a whack in the thigh.

I was not there when the big chunks

were crumbled or seeds planted,

Not even for when the first foot of

growth emerged into the spring sun.

But I was there for the harvest.

What in life is more sensual than

a hot, red tomato exploding juice

all the way to the back of your throat?

What could be more satisfying than

the crunch and burn of a raw turnip,

dug from its bed and gnawed by

a kid hiking alone to the creek?

Once in a while there was a price to pay…

“Go pick a bucket of peas!” The next

hour or two a bent back, and then

on the porch shelling enough for dinner.

The okra was just pods of snot

but worth the time because, on the

high delta, you ate what you had,

and rolled the wet in cornmeal to fry.

Best of all was the orchard, a bit

of heaven where, on some Saturdays

the man came and sprayed a cloud of

DDT for kids to run in and breathe deep.

But June was peaches juicy enough

to make you take a bath, or the sweet

white ones to peel and eat as proof God

not only loves us, but likes us too.

All these decades later, it is easy to

see why progress is not always forward, 

nor leads to happier times when even 

the artificial is an electronic fake .

Reviews

[Lorry]

And try spraying that stuff now within ten miles of a kid and you'll be hauled up to the UN on human rights abuses!
I think we have them to thank for some living to the ripe 100's, so God help the following generations when they begin wilting in their fifties with burnout from having to answer E mails all day, as they descend into a virtual unlife, plugging yourself into a keyboard and enjoying your downtime with what will essentially be realer life ™, sponsored by "insert some futuristic sounding name, like Amazon, Google or Microsoft, but not X as Elon would have long since disappeared up his own a*s hole and been replaced with a more real looking boy!
I've never eaten a raw turnip, but my parents grew their own fruit and veg too, which was weird because they were all in the fruit n veg business. But I do recall those long walks to bed to lie down after mowing the lawn with one of those manual lawnmowers that made the hodadadod sound and we always moaned about, until dad said we could go old school and use the scythe if we wanted.
And picking peas, potatoes etc and then being moaned at because they were too small, like I picked those ones on purpose!
They used to ask us to pick a big juicy pineapple or some Bananas for dessert, but no matter how ghard we looked, we couldn't find those trees. I used to think life was easier, but back then all I thought was it would be easier to plant some self picking cheesecake trees! 😊

[Vol]

Give me the DDT any day over virtual reality... or whatever the new "real life" entails these days.

[Lorry]

Yep! It rounded off the edges of your voice and stopped us all squealing like high pitched cissies, which I'm sure will get me cancelled for saying, but then again that's only a threat if you care about it.
Maybe we all need a good old fashioned crop dusting now and again, to grow hairs on your chest... And ears and nose and eyes too! 😊

[Chris Shaw]

Living off the land. There is something so attractive about that, but I am sure it must have been hard graft. Long hours, but maybe satisfying hours. We have come along way from those days. Sadly in my opinion we have lost something precious. Such a descriptive write Vol and June peaches have my mouth watering. You brought back a memory for me. Great Uncle George had a peach tree and grape vines in his wonderful overgrown jungle of a garden. How I loved getting lost in it. Enjoyed my early morning visit here.

Chris

[Vol]

Chris,
Hahaha, if they haven't got peaches in heaven, I ain't goin'...
Vol

[jacob erin-cilberto]

the good old days, the simpler days...life might have been hard back then...
but worth the effort.
j.

[Vol]

Jacob,
It WAS hard work. But it was satisfying work. And almost no one was obese. Best of all when we went to bed, we were TIRED and slept... today when we go to bed, we are mentally exhausted from sensory overload and barely sleep at all.
Vol

[Ken Simm.]

A true piece of old yet new world poetry. A true collection of historic visuals tht I could almost see filmed in flickery sepia. A monument of a poem.
And then more. When the future is not always IT

[Vol]

Ken,
Thank you so much!
For such a monumental optimist, I sure am terrified these days...
Vol

[Ken Simm.]

You have got me with you there. My friend.