Concrete Shroud

The sojourner stood
On the hard concrete
Looking up at concrete
Towering over him
Wrapping round him
Overshadowing him.
The cold winds whipped
Beat on his back
As he walked
Pushing him down
Into his coat.
He paused at a street
To wait for traffic
To stop.
He walked,
Almost in a daze
Wondering about home
Dreaming about home
Remembering the hills.
Hungry for the hills
Weary in the city
Cold, dreading another day
Covered in concrete.

Call of the Wild

To think that a squeek,
A simple noise in the woods
Would pull my mind
Away from the stock market
Would alert my mind
Like an old blood hound
As I sat up and listened
For two chipmunks
Chirping, squeeking, calling
Singing love songs
Across an old dirt road.

My mind fell away
From the woes of Wall Street
As my feet wandered
To the edge of the road
I listened and stepped
One slow step at a time
Seeking the source
On my side of the road
Softly, gently, one foot
Then the other
Along the grasses
Stepping over leaves
And twigs that might
Crackle and pop.
Like a mythical hunter
I rose to the occasion
Searched for the source
Till I saw a tail, striped
Slide into a hole
Left by a woodpecker
In a fallen pine.
Then, as I slipped closer
The chipmunk turned
Sat still watching
Me watching him.
For an eternity
We watched,
Waited,
Still and silent
Each in our own
World paused.
My vision blurred
And saw nothing
But a hole in a log
Filled with the tiny face
Of this chipmunk
That pulled my mind
From losses and bailouts.
The loud chirps
Bigger than this creature
Should be making
Brought me home
To these hills,
To the world
Back to what really matters.
And I wonder
When is the last time
A Wall Street Wonder
A President, Advisor,
Prime Minister, Senator
Big Three mogul
Stopped to listen
To a tiny
Call of the Wild?
Then I wonder
If the world might
Be better
If they did.

Love Song

The hills are calling to me more and more in the last few weeks. Work, a crazy economy, terrible gas prices and Wall Street making folks crazy have kept me away far too long. I have been an indentured servant to the needs of the job and my heart flutters with grieving as I drive past fields or waiting corn, meadows full of deer grazing on dying grasses. When I see birds gathering for their southern journey, I dream of the hills of home, of my little cabin in the woods, of the oranges, reds and yellows of tall oaks, hickory and maple trees.

Soon and very soon I shall escape, without telling anyone, without a word of warning, I will slip out quietly and run home again, to the mountain I love, to my muse, my solice, my quiet place.

I dream of sitting on my porch with a big ol' glass of sweet tea, maybe my harmonica in my pocket and a dulcimer on my lap. Maybe I'll play a tune or two or maybe I'll just sit and listen to the whisper of the woods, calling to me through the evening as twilight sneaks up on me, finding myself in the night before I am ready to give over the day to sleep.

I will dream of the trees, of the rocks and ridges that call to me, that sing a love song in the night, that lull me to sleep.

I will awaken refreshed and glad. Morning with dance with me in the dew laden grass and we shall wrap our arms around the day, morning and I. We will dance and the birds will sing our joy at being home once again.

That is where my heart is. They say that when the last queen of Hawaii died, she had her heart removed and buried secretly while her body went through the dignities of a Western Culture funeral.

Maybe she had it right.

Wherever my body shall rest, my heart shall dance in the wet dew with the morning for eternity.

Memories in the grass

A wedge of geese
Fly with a "ziz, ziz, ziz"
Of wings
In a sky of gold
And purple swirled
Around the full moon.
Little dog pulls
Hard on her leash.
Huntin' for memories
In the grass.

Letter from Cousin Peanut

Dear Crazy Uncle Jess,

This here is your Cousin Peanut.
We have been enjoyin' the fire out of your Inferno Jelly! I just finished a peanut butter an' Inferno Jelly sandwich. Do we ever go through milk when we eat one of them things.

My buddy Junebug Jones an' I was sittin' out on the porch the other day eatin' some of your jelly on biscuits. We was laughin' about how dang hot it can be an' what we could do with it.

Junebug got this funny grin on his face an' asked if I wanted to do some bull-slappin'. You know how it goes; You jump into a paddock where a big ol' bull is, sneak up on him an' slap him in the backside an' run like crazy. He bet me ten dollars he could slap the big ol' Angus bull we have an' I could not. I took that bet 'cause I knew that bull was as gentle as a puppy dog.

I went in the house to get my shoes on. When I came out he had a fly swat in his hand an' said he was gonna swat that bull with that there swat. I thought, "Big deal, that ain't nothin'"

He climbed the fence, snuck up on that bull and whacked him on the backside with that flyswat.

That ol' bull raised his head, looked 'round an' got this funny look on his face. He then commenced to snortin', squallin' an' runnin' round that paddock like he was crazy. He jumped, danced an' scooted his ol' backside like a pupdog. I ain't never seen anything like it. He carried on for nearly an hour!

Then Junebug told me he rubbed some of your Inferno Jelly on that flyswat. No wonder that bull was going on like that. Junebug would be scootin' an' squallin' too if he had been swatted with that wonderful stuff. I cussed him a while for wastin' good jelly.

Finally we noticed that bull lookin' right mean at us. We ran as fast as we could but he came through the fence an' right at the porch. Things flew all over the place an' that wonderful jar of Inferno Jelly fell into my pet hog's bed. You remember Roscoe, my pet hog? He has really grown big. I can't get him in the front seat of the truck anymore. I bet he weighs near a thousand pounds.

Anyway, we got that dang bull into the paddock, rinsed his backside off an' got him cooled down. I told Junebug he didn't win no bet an' he had near killed that big ol' bull. He sat for hours in the creek.

What I didn't know was that my hog Roscoe had done ate every drop of that Crazy Uncle Jester's Inferno Jelly. He had even licked the jar clean. (I can send it back to you an' you can refill it without even washin' it.). We finally saw the jar an' stood waitin' for Roscoe to commence carryin' on like the bull did.

He never moved a muscle. He just stood there. After a while I noticed he was gettin' sort of red... them brown. Finally he started steamin'! I went over an' touched him an' burned my finger. 'Course I put that burned finger in my mouth.

It tasted wonderful, spicy, hot an' like bacon. I realized that Inferno Jelly had cooked that ol' hog from the inside out.

We slid a couple planks under the hog an' carried it up on the porch, called some buddies an' had some of the best barbecue pork, marinated an' cooked from the inside out by Crazy Uncle Jester's Inferno Jelly.

Just thought you would want to know.
Your Cousin,
Peanut Chappell