Sunday, October 26, 2014

A Homecoming

                                                                                     Attribution: M Bednar
Image: Blue Ridge Parkway Farm (here)

The flight was uneventful and boring
Only fluffs of white clouds by the window
As though one is bedded where angels tread
Softly as babies on a luxurious lullaby
Mind occupied with events days ago
Of an impending Board Meeting he was to chair
More or less duplicating a similar event
Of a decade ago having arrived at the Big Apple
With visions of a being a successful trader

Acting on an e-mail from his elder sister
Hurrying him home to his roots in the country
For she is down from lots of elderly ailments
Wanting him back to see to the family property
Acres of land in the beautiful country-side
But left to the vagaries of weather these past years

Left word he should be back within days
Left everything to his deputy and off he went
He went back exactly the way he came
With lots of questions and anticipations

There he was now standing looking at old Joe’s
A cabin where he spent lots of long hours
Listening to old Joe’s yarn of his days as a farm-hand
On his family ranch tending to his grandad’s  livestock

                                                                               Attribution: M Bednar
Image: Blue Ridge Parkway Farm (here)

The poetry book is still on the table the larder undisturbed
Very unlike a well organized old Joe to leave in such a hurry
The woods behind the cabin where he used to chase rabbits
Laid bird-traps with old Joe’s insistence and skilled expertise
Reflected the same mystery as when he was a kid before

Why everyone left the ranch just a few months after him
Why no word except for a few letters in the beginning
Perhaps his sister should know and he needed to know
There’ll be lots of email to be relayed in days to come
Among the first is to his deputy who is waiting for his return
It’ll be a long wait for he decided to tend to the ranch first

He is not coming back! Not just yet!


For Margaret's hosting at Play it Again #10 at Real Toads and
my feeble attempt at trying to emulate Dylan Thomas the only choice
of the 3 offered that seems like a free verse and near enough.
Shared with Brian's hosting at d'Verse - homecoming

20 comments:

  1. What a beautiful poem, full of expression and the message certainly coming over,
    Excellent Write Hank.

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  2. A trip back to the farmland can be full of nostalgia ~ The ranch is a throwback to the simple life then ~ Quite a mystery you have penned here Hank ~

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  3. i'm curious about the stories that happened while he was away.... always both - fascinating and maybe also painful to go back to such a memory loaded place...

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  4. i have been to that farm in your picture...and cool that you went back home...when called there is def something to that....would not mind sitting and listening to joe's yarns a bit....

    fixed your link at dverse...it went elsewhere...

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  5. You have really captured my attention with this poem.

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  6. There is a time for leaving .. there is a time of going back... I think that's the essence of life.. we just have to do it before it's too late...

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  7. A trip though the memories can bring on much. We all have to leave things at some point and yet in many cases we can always take a trip back

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  8. What a nice story. I think we all feel that questioning nostalgia when we return home to the proverbial ranch. Most of us don't stay though.
    Enjoyed this Hank.

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  9. What started with family news turned into a bit of an intriguing mystery. I can how such a thing would suck me in.

    Also, I want that cabin! :)

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  10. This made me think how we all dream of escaping from the overwhelm of modern life, corporate constraints, money-making trap etc. etc. But I wonder whether we can ever really go back (or whether we'd be happy doing so).

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  11. As, I was reading I felt like I stepped back in time and a part of me wanted to hear the old yarns.

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  12. Sounds like he needs to stay and solve that mystery. And absorb a lot of memories.

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  13. Sometimes, you need to go home…very well done & perfect for the homecoming theme! Thank you.

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  14. I like how we start from a distance and travel together into the area, then to the property, then inside--to the close-up intimacies of a family/home. That detail about the poetry book made it all so real.

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  15. love the Blue Ridge during this time of year... wonderful how the story grew throughout

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  16. I grew up in the country. When I went back home part of me reunited with my old home and part of me could no longer relate. I had put too much distance between me and tobacco fields...beautiful piece

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  17. I enjoyed the fact that he still found the mystery in surroundings...kind of some catalyst place to test someone's growth....nice

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  18. too many board meetings and work work work… I'd want to get away too! Is home ever what we remember it to be when we were young? I'd like to think so…

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