A former place this, a patch where roots rattle,
where stubble has a ferrous frizzle.
A long-truncated railroad stop
humming still with a faded reality.
As dry voices on the wind, they return
- the homesteaders and journeymen,
the harnessed horses.
Pants' cuffs carry kernels
long planted elsewhere.
Caps, coats, and carts
Sweat, rustle and creak,
an invisible locomotion of leaving and arrival.
employed upon an iron labor.
The tall dry weeds are talkative.
Brown boots seem to shuffle
as they wait here or idle.
A hollow clock clacks,
its innards now
are a nest for ticking birds.
Dandelions anticipate twirling flight
under a corn fed sun.
A mid-day heat thrums fragmented rails.
The station seems almost ready
to receive
as if its bygone world
had not forever disembarked.
In the dusty embrace of Jharkhand’s tribal hills,
Where once vibrant green swayed like laughter in the wind,
Now the palash trees wear a shroud of soot,
A ghostly veil draped over their fiery blooms,
Once fertile earth now a canvas of neglect,
The hills stand as silent witnesses to forgotten songs.
Not long ago, the arrival of a car sparked joy,
Children, wild with wonder, chased it like shooting stars,
Now, when planes carve through the sky towards the city,
They scamper to the hilltops, hearts fluttering with dreams,
Curiosity ignites, imaginations take flight,
As if the very air whispers secrets of the skies.
Boys return home, eyes alight with questions,
When will they soar through clouds, touch the heavens?
In classrooms, tales of space unfold like cosmic tapestries,
Their visions stretch beyond earthly bounds,
A longing for the stars, ignited by flickering screens.
The mind, a precious jewel, must remain untainted,
To dream lofty dreams, to let aspirations soar,
Whether or not the stars align in their favor,
Let visions and imaginations rise above the hills,
Like eagles on the wind, unbound and free.
I appreciate the scenic beauty
By walking distance near at home
I realized there are few shady
Beautiful places the town offers
Such beauty gives aesthetic glee
I have walk the house courtyard
Dream the thick green lush forest
From where I stand get my true joy.
Plain and green sight
Feeling peaceful
Rainy smell.
Rural doctors
In quiet towns where roads are few,
Where fields stretch wide and skies are blue,
There walk the healers, brave and true,
The doctors of the rural view.
With bags in hand and hearts of gold,
Through rain and shine, through heat and cold,
They journey far where need is great,
To serve the towns that time forgot.
In simple clinics, makeshift rooms,
They fight disease, dispel the glooms,
With limited, yet mighty, tools,
They stand as pillars, patient schools.
Their knowledge vast, their skills refined,
In every touch, in every mind,
They bring a hope, a healing light,
To places often out of sight.
For every life they gently save,
In every soul they make more brave,
They build a bridge, they pave a way,
For better health with each new day.
In fields where whispers of the past,
Meet modern care that’s built to last,
These rural doctors, strong and kind,
Are heroes in the humblest find.
So let us sing their noble deeds,
Their tireless work to meet our needs,
In rural lands, they stand and serve,
With endless heart and steadfast nerve.
Written Sept 1, 2024
© Dr Upma A. Sharma
Sweating in the rustic dusts of Nazareth, you laboured.
As a farm labourer, ironsmith, weaver, and shepherd,
You ploughed with the peasants, who were curious yet loving.
They were teachers from whom wisdom, like clear streams, flowed, gushing.
You walked, pondering over the Sea of Galilee.
Where fishermen struggled like lilies amidst barberry,
The breeze, amalgamated with the Abba message, blew.
With you, the fraternity of the folks, day by day, grew.
You read about all philosophies and theologies.
Small or great, each one therein had unique ideologies.
The rich, though they seemed strong, bent in the winds of faith like reeds.
You held all of them in the same balance, mending their creeds.
Each herb, shrub, plant, tree, blossom, fruit, and weed imparted wisdom.
In the soul of each seed, the lord of lords founded the kingdom.
Up in long bands of gray and white
angry clouds are whirling,
fingers stretch downwards to the ground,
faint traces of swirling.
the farmer sees it and suspects
what nature is unfurling.
Glad at least it came in the day,
not stole in come evening,
he locks the barn and heads downstairs,
in basement remaining.
The air moans loudly when it starts,
vortex boldly roaring,
snaps tree-trunks off like they’re matchsticks,
Sends the branches soaring.
Birds fly off in a panicked flock,
much too scared for crowing,
the wheat flexes, and flattens low,
disturbed from its growing.
A mad chaos, its motion blurred
by the rush of spinning,
if any storm-chasers lived here,
you know they’d be grinning.
But alas, this is not the plains,
with their F-5s looming,
oh no, this is upstate New York,
and those hills aren’t moving.
The block the flow, they interrupt,
winds are quickly fading,
it barely lasted three minutes,
the dark whorl abating.
Rural landscape views
Of Switzerland is awesome
A sight for sore eyes.
Rural Sunday
I sat on a milk ramp by a road
that has not suffered the indignity
to be covered in a black trickle
Sunday!
the sky was eternally blue
I could
standing up, see the sea
the water was azure as well
is azure deeper blue than the sky
or is it a word used by poets in
the hope he will sound romantic?
Fed up sitting there, but I sat
wanted to see a drifting cloud
the immaculate sky
a tall ship crosses the ocean for a while
balance on the horizon
sailing upside down
till it sank under the weight of the world
Fell asleep!
awoke as the sun's shift was over
a car stopped
the driver offered me a lift
Imperially, I waved him off
I wanted to keep my reveries
a bit longer.
What scene would I want to find comfort in
more than this one,
an ordinary morning in the farmhouse kitchen,
blue checked curtains swaying,
wooden shelves with plates and jars,
the radio softly playing,
a paring knife in my hand?
It gives me time to think
about all that is waking outside--
birds calling from the trees,
dew glistening on the garden's leaves,
while beyond the fields the world rolls on,
vivid, bustling, dawn breaking with the day.
But beyond this kitchen
there is nothing that I need,
not even a ticket to some grand event,
or a sleek, silver-trimmed coffee maker
that sits in shiny kitchens downtown.
No, it's all here,
the orange slices in their clear plastic bags,
the loaf of bread on the cutting board,
a jar of blackberry jam,
not to mention the child's painting
held to the fridge by a magnet,
and the way these three lunch bags--
each a different color--
wait in quiet stillness.
So forgive me
if I pause now and listen
to the hum of the refrigerator as it purrs
while my mind
wanders a bit across the acres,
where the sunlight
gently warms the wheat
and my thoughts rest in a farmhouse
surrounded by rolling hills
Grab up some pine I cut up last weekend,
back creaks as I put it up on the block,
splitting maul flashes, in an arc descends,
sinks deep in the wood with a meaty THWOCK.
Logs splinter off, tumble across brown grass,
coated in saw-dust from the chainsaw's blade,
small bits for kindling, they catch flame fast,
mix with bacon grease, fire-starters made.
Rack up the big stuff in a woody wall,
looks like a redoubt from the frontier days,
it seems like a lot, but we’ll burn it all,
when the snow comes here, it does come to stay.
Clean out the camp stove before frost sets deep,
nothing feels warmer than wood-fired heat.
Big open space rises
like a hot air balloon
overlooking Farmers fields
of corn, hay and beans
On an October morning
as cows scatter from
their milking to find
a good eating place
To graze for the next few hours
The chirr of parched insect wings –
bible dust preaching
from long abandoned boots.
Baked into the sky
homesteads linger on the burnt stumps
of exhausted summers.
Dander creaks on dry porches,
wardrobes and rooms open
in a denim haze.
Homesteaders planted a light here
then at days end
dug it up
in earthen mouthfuls.
Aprons were filled, table-tops charged.
Out of the back of a model T
a dapper man sells brushes,
he speaks of things unfarmed
the Brylcreem shine of city sights
until she is swept away.
Such moments go unrecorded
unless by chance you find
a strand of long hair
whipping astray on a skewed field gate.
~~~~
edit
A somber dawn breaks upon a hillside
strewn with hedges of dew
drenched blackberries
Written 8/19/22
FIRST PLACE
Your Thoughts On Blackberries Contest
Sponsor: Matt Caliri
In the country we do not have city vison,
we have a phosphorus luster,
we have snails and worms
that turn over a silvered mulch.
The slow burn of a late dusk
kindles sun-setting shadows –
the sheen of beetle clipper-claws.
A chitinous moonlight flickers
upon crystalline windowpanes.
Then there is the glint of gravel in starry waters,
unearthed shimmer paths and a leafy luminosity
in midnight cisterns.
Those stars, they keep arriving
until the darkness shrinks between their light,
and if it is overcast, we set a lamp on a high place,
one that can be seen from hidden and
faraway mountain-tops.
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