Long Bayous Poems

"He made a difference."

Gramps, my mother's father, 
Dave Luke -- my grandfather, 
a tall unlettered white (decidedly white) 
Louisiana man -- was born August 1888.  
He lived 87 years.  He grew under 
the...

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I am walking in your footprints again. My bare feet are so small when contained within the imprint of your own We have walked this soft grassy road, side by side. Now I walk only...

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Emancipation: Delayed But Not Dismayed
      (Apropos Of Juneteenth Celebration)
[As Relevant Today As When First Posted, 2021] 

This is the day the Lord has made.
Let us rejoice and celebrate
We’re still here,...

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(Apropos Of Juneteenth Celebration)

This is the day the Lord has made;
Let us rejoice and celebrate
Because we’re still here…marching on
With our eyes stayed on the prize.
Let us rejoice and celebrate
Because we’re aware that we are not
The...

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(Apropos Of Juneteenth Celebration)

This is the day the Lord has made;
Let us rejoice and celebrate
Because we’re still here…marching on
With our eyes stayed on the prize.
Let us rejoice and celebrate
Because we’re aware that we are not
The...

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Hello God, are you there?
I’ve been searching for you everywhere.
Starting out in my mother’s womb 
Not very long ago,
When my life was barely beginning 
Before I began to know…

Anything about you 
And this world I...

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The Hurricane was Harvey
By Franklin Price
8/31/2017

The hurricane was Harvey, what an unassuming name
Left the western Yucatan. across the Gulf he came
Building up his power to a category four
Slammed into the Texas coast with wind, and...

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I have traveled the world over but like the United States best
From Maine to California, north and south, east, and west.
Born in West Virginia, I live in the Commonwealth of Kentucky
Have visited Vermont, New Hampshire...

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Isn’t she beautiful?
When you top a steep slope and look down upon her hills, tumbling over each other for miles, covered in greenery of new spring, you realize that she, the land, is immaculate.
But she,...

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Way down here
In the swamps of Dixie,
Where I learned to dance
With gators grinning,
There’s music like none
You’ve ever heard.
It laces the bayous
In passionate tones,
Enough to make you
Want to move your feet.

There’s more history
In this place
Than you...

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perhaps i should have looked away 
my mind takes me back to the general store 
of black liquorish sticks red cobble stone walk ways 
the reading of immortal poems as william mason
 
sounds off hot...

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4:00 AM time to check the trot-lines.
Catfish and turtles strung out deep in the muddy waters
We would string the lines from cypress trees across a channel
And mark them with fluorescent tape so we knew which...

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When I was a small child
I would always be outside,
Must have blazed a hundred paths
Just to see what I could find.
Then they put me in a suit,
And I cried out “I won’t go!”
Left my home...

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GENTLY MY MIND PORTRAYED 
AN EMPTY SADNESS WHILE I'D CRADLED 
THEE NESTLED THOUGHT
LEAVING THE INFAMOUS BONDARIES 

AWAITING THE VIEWING 
OF THOMAS MANN'S QUIET SETTING
BETWEEN THE SOLID STRUCTURES 
OF STILL RUNNING WATER SEEPING
 
OVER THE GOTHIC...

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I know better then
to be here.  I've
been told.
Things happen here.
Bad things.
Yet I am drawn.  No.
 More like willed.
I have not the power
to resist this place

I smell the decay. 
The rotting stench
Windfall trees
laying as...

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Title: Southern Grace


In the land where magnolias bloom,
Beneath the southern sun's warm embrace,
There lies a region filled with tales,
A tapestry woven with Southern grace.

Amidst the fields of cotton white,
Whispers of history, rich and deep,
A symphony...

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I’ve heard it said that poetry is dead
But I don’t believe that’s true.
It runs in our veins like water to rain
Somewhere inside me and you.

It’s up in the air, in circles and squares
And oceans, rivers...

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Dimly lit, I sit
in a Mexican kitchen
near the Tropic of Cancer.
A TV is tuned
to inane noises;
dogs at my feet,
oranges in a bowl
on a table:
a specific place and time.
And I am dreaming --
dreaming of Louisiana
in twilight...

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Way down south near the marshlands,
near the bayous, and close to the lake.
There is a city with its old wonders.
A place where no one barely sleeps.

Parties move up and down the cobbled streets.
The brass bands...

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Cthulu lurks in the evil cabin in the words 

Deep in the bayous 
of Louisiana 
sits an abandoned cabin 
in the swamps

the cabin is inhabited 
by an ancient evil creature
newly risen from the depths 
of...

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Broken       “Perfect”       
Blowout      Preventer
Billowing    Petroleum
Burning       Profusely

Bodies   ...

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gently we measured
our compassionate realm
I was takened by the mental storm 
of quiet gestures beckoning

the calm bayous the sinking earth
of hanging moss craving darkness 
while seeking lights inner most hues
catered to the wild eyes of...

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Travel taught me one precious thing,
There is always better Elsewhere,
You love your village, visit the Tyrol,
You love Cathy, Sue has more beautiful blue eyes,

My travels taught me to change buses often,
You’ve seen Paris, go see...

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Snow melting, icicles dripping from the eave
Hint that winter’s frigid air may soon leave,
Replaced by warm breezes from the south
In swampy bayous return the cottonmouth.
When mulberry buds are ready to burst
Buttercups turn upward like they...

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A stone hard imprint
Apologies
No need
A storm to never blow over
A heart
To continuously bleed
A way of life
Out the window
Are values taught
The right way
Please
Thank you
May I
How would it feel
To live in a time
When everything can add up...

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