"GOODBYE TO ALL THAT," SPRING IS HERE!

It is still cold here 
   in the Rio Grande Valley
not far east of the 
   River itself 

The trees are beginning 
    to "bud out" a bit...
The lawns are turning green...
    Crocuses have bloomed
and can daffodils 
    be far behind?
A robin was seen on the lawn
    searching for a cold worm,
and a few lost summery 
    clouds drift by daily 
when the sun is shining...
    as if trying to catch
up with the cloud crowd...
    wherever it went...

The two ever-quarreling 
    blue jays are back
and can be heard from
    the very tops 
of the pines  which  
    are always green
year -round...

It may be a bit early for 
    the frogs and snails
to come out of the ground,
   and the voice of the
turtles is yet to be heard
   "in our land..."   and 
it has been known 
    to snow    way down
into springtime    
    in these parts...

So it seems like winter 
   was just yesterday
(but it was three days ago)
    and people accuse
The Poet of being 
    "cold-natured" as the 
saying goes and 
    of covering up too much
when it's cold winter-time...

But in reality he stays pretty
    warm all the freezing
days of winter and of life...   
     except for his nose...

People don't really pay 
   much attention to him,
and it's okay   but they 
    oft write, admiring 
his Bear Quilt     and ask

"Where can I get one?"
---------
MIL
THIRD DAY OF SPRING
24 MARCH 19

MEMORIES OF SNAPPING GREEN BEANS

 

Most kids who grew up
   in the thirties and forties
had mothers or grandmothers
   who gardened and
raised their own veggies

and they remember nights
    all gathered around the Philco
or later the RCA...while momma
    "snapped the beans" there
in the pan in her lap       and
    she was still wearing
her wet apron from supper
   and washing the dishes...

This was ever etched on my
    mind from simpler times....
times when Americans
    were acting like Americans,
and

several days ago BE walked
    into my Writing Place
and set down this awful big
    clear plastic sack
of nice green beans!

and she said "Snap these for me
    and we'll have 'em
for supper!"    I, being a sous chef
   in my own right, calculated
an hour of sous work at best
   and said "okay,"
with limited enthusiasm....

Then an idea hit me. And I reached
  for my Fiskar Orange Hunting
Scissors, from their secret place...
     then--- whack, whack, whack,
was clipping five or six beans
     at a time    and I'll swanny,
the air  was green and filled
    with beans and half beans,
and especially ends of beans
    going every which way---
flying thru the air

For a time the whole world was
    just GREEN    how else
can I say it?

My dear mother...and even Ocasio
    would be proud of me
and
   to this very hour,
      not a day passes
          that green bean ends
still turn up from.... somewhere
    around my writing place.
----------
MIL
15 MARCH 19

TWELVE LITTLE FLITTING BIRDS

On the grain hanging 
   just outside my window
barely five feet away
   are off and on about
twelve little gray birds
   you can't predict when
they will come   or how long
    they will stay

sometimes you can't 
  even see ...the grain or
tell how many   for they are
   the most flitting, energetic,
nervous and yes-- hungry 
   little birds ever seen

they just peck and flit and jerk
    and nudge each other 
like it's their last meal on earth
   and one just is mesmerized
by them     just watching
   for they   are never still

and he thinks---"I'm going to look 
   them up in one of our 
numerous bird books " (good luck)
   and so    I grab a handy bird book
and look up thru the window

but       they are gone  suddenly 
          every one    gone
----------
MIL
14 MARCH 2019

RATTLESNAKE TIME BRINGS MEMORIES

By Guest Writer, Levi Brake




Levi and Mil, spring of 1950

My earliest memory in life is of my mother wielding a garden hoe,

killing a rattler on the front steps of our house in Sweetwater,

Texas, another renowned "Rattlesnake Capital”of the world.

I went on in life to kill every rattlesnake I saw wherever I

lived until many years later, while living with my family in

a nice house on the desert outskirts of Phoenix, AZ.  During

the hot summer months I would occasionally rouse my family

from their sleep well before dawn and gather up the

necessities for cooking breakfast in the desert and we would

head out to one of my favorite places. There I would cook

bacon and eggs and we would eat while listening to the

desert wake up around us.  

A narrow trail led from where I parked the truck down to a

flat area near the bottom of a large arroyo.  Just before

daybreak on that particular morning, my son Johnie, then

about eight years old, started down the trail first and very

quickly came running back up excitedly saying "Dad, there's

a snake on the trail!".  I grabbed my pistol and he and I

went back down and sure enough, there was this big rattler

coiled in the middle of the trail, his head sticking up and

his tongue darting out menacingly.  It was too cool for him

to strike and he was lying there waiting for the sun to come

up and warm him.  

Standing there and looking at one of nature's proud

creatures completely at my mercy, I guess I realized that it

was we who were the intruders there.  I sent Johnie back up

to the truck and told him to bring me a shovel.  I picked

that rascal up on my shovel and carried him back up to the

desert floor and took him off a ways and set him down to

wait for the sun.  Though I've had many opportunities since,

I haven't killed another snake.

That's my best snake story, although I have others, as do

most folks who have lived in the Southwest for any period of

time.

*************************

by Guest Writer, Levi Brake, CHS '51
1933-2018