Old pots

Blue Tues., 7a m
raining; winds out of the North
the rain lashes indescrimately  down about the horses,
pelting  their backsides in a hellish downpour  as they feed out  in the pasture .

The day promises nothing.
Heads down, they feed in a mechanical cluster
Foraging in a rapid manner 
They munch the rye grass; as if every bite was sustaining them
and bringing warmth to their massive bodies.

The leaves are falling in droves now
A weekend ago they dappled in the sun
  Golden and russet as if right out of Maxfield Parish
They set ablaze a landscape that now pummels towards earth
mottled, muddy, and forgotten into the  slick wet of the soil
.

A paltry fire stirs in the kitchen hearth
a handful of wood shavings has resurrected its warmth
driving a few tiny flames to lick and kiss the twigs into a small inferno
to cast fantastic shadows along the old farm walls and out into a day
that has no promise.


I brew an Italian roast; its black goodness waifs the kitchen air
as does a pot of Irish oatmeal steeping steam in an old pot
The pot was my mothers, and her mothers before that.
Surely there are better pots; but you'll not convince me of that.

Here in the  dark, dank, dismal  morning  of  poor  light
with all the world awash  in the purgatory  of   deluge 
I meditate on this  old pot as if it were a family crystal
and gaze into a world of long ago.
where at my mothers knee I am once again listening
to some long ago Gene Autry or to  the sonorous Arthur Godfrey
warble the morning  away  from the speaker of an  old kitchen Zenith
perched on a  white enameled table top.

Oh if that table top could speak, the history, the family of characters that would troop  through that back door making gossip and mayhem, and chatter away as if there were not a care in the world.

There is not a better play  for such  characters
As  there was in those days, when my wee face was innocent and bright and pink cheeked  as if  life was a Christmas present of always and happy expectation s
.
Andy Griffith and Aunt Bee couldn't hold a candle to it.
There was a postman who rang the bell,
a milkman who tickled me, a garbage man who sang,
a telephone operator who knew my birthday, a yardman who danced Bo jangles, and
a laundress who sang low down blues and there was even an iceman who cometh on Fri day afternoons.
They all knew me; called my name, pinched my cheek, and told fantastic stories of the country and the big city beyond endearing me with exploits and tall tales that would impregnate my imagination to their souls forever.

Relatives, (and there was many )
. Was an endless parade of characters providing for a colorful background
of dysfunctional eccentricity?
For one I had crazy uncles (one verifiably) .
They were an in many ways my male role models and they paid for it in Ernest by bearing the  brunt of my tackles and practice kicks  
My  ante bellum grandparents; didn't seem to mind, as long as they were convinced it was the last century and not the present, they never  seemed  to mind   
. then there were my aunts; who weren't sure of the changing styles would always seem to invent  their own .
Their give-a-way was that they wore too much lipstick which they would impart with impunity if you got too close.

Then always there was a mix of nutty neighbors thrown into the equation
Tipsy and full with gossip or jokes each one trying to out do the other with their simplicity and home spun eccentricity
Each one a little more battier than the other.

Upstairs, downstairs Thanksgivings and Christmas 
It was a curious mix of characters, Gin, philandering husbands who gathered round not the TV but an old 1890 Baldwin (from the big house) where young and old would sing tin pan alley pounded out on the ivories by
A grand uncle who survived the trenches of the first war.

This was serious stuff; the room was transformed from 20th century to 19 Th. century
By the magical pounding of those keys with a twinkle in his eye and a two bit cigar parked in the corner of his mouth
Here in the dim light of day, my heart tugs for their presence
They are no more, but in the steady perk of that old black pot
They are with me forever. Michael;
-- To terminate puerile preservation prattling among pals and the uncoffee-ed, or to change your settings, go to: http://listserv.icors.org/archives/bullamanka-pinheads.html