Monday, July 24, 2017

"Grandfather’s Place." by Mike Burke

"There was a kind of plenary indulgence to be gained 
in the distant viewing of it's familiar presence." 
© Mark W. Ó Brien 2016


Grandfather built this place back in the 20s barehanded, after he returned from the Great War. After being in the terrible, muddy, deadly trenches he said he need a lot of open space with a grand view. His father had willed him a piece of property that met his needs. His two brothers helped him hauling the materials in the farm wagons with the work horses Duke, Nipper Otis and Shelby.

As he got older he would sit in his lawn chair every chance he got, transfixed, gazing over the fields to the tall silent mountains in the distance. He didn’t want to be disturbed.

When grandfather died he was buried in the field behind the shed along the stone wall facing the mountains he loved, next to his faithful workhorses Duke, Nipper Otis and Shelby.

The mountains hover
Watching all that passes by
They will outlast all.

~

© Mike Burke 2017

~

Mike Burke, a blue-collar poet who winters in the nation’s oldest city and summers in a compound nestled in the Helderbergs.

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