Enjoying the Folk(s)

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Enjoying the Folk(s)

The screen door's left ajar,
boots vibrate old wooden boards,
glasses clink upon the bar,
and mandolin's melody is bested
only by banjo player's chords,
(or so his girlfriend declares
over a glass of mountain moonshine).

It's tucked away places like this
where generations of real politics are strummed,
where people nod their heads, understand;
as life is simple and a guitar's persuasion
can be won with a boom chuck
or fancy finger-picking made possible
only by selling one's soul to the devil
(or so I'm told).

Cigarette smoke curls its way to the ceiling
and time nods a sleepy head,
almost as if suspended, in no hurry
to usher in the buttercream light
that'll soon peak its way over the Blue Ridge.

Here is a place with history no textbook contains;
a place with its own oral traditions of war,
civil rights, hardship, love, hope of escape.
Of spirituals offered in fields, boxcars, living rooms,
and here, in the heart of Appalachia,
where community and family are celebrated,
and "popular' has been redefined.

So I relax and listen,
blink smoke out of my eyes, dare to inhale,
a bit, and absorb that which is unfamiliar;
listen to ethnic rhythms, and clink my glass
with that of a newfound friend.

by Margaret Bednar, April 1, 2019

This is linked with "Imaginary Garden with Real Toads - Music with Marian - April She Will Come - Simon and Garfunkel"

Also linked with "NaPoWriMo" - National Poetry Month, a celebration of poetry which takes place each April, was introduced in 1996 and is organized by the Academy of American Poets as a way to increase awareness and appreciation of poetry in the United States. 

Hatchlings

Hatchlings

I held their world in the palm of my hand
as well as pieces of what was left of the nest.
I was in awe of necks so delicate and slight,
tufted heads balancing, bobbing, and heavy.

With my finger, I touched them; featherless, pink,
mouths opened - did they think I their mother?
I had no sustenance to give.

In fact, I was the giant that tumbled their world,
doomed them never to soar open skies
or sing sunrise melodies.

They had perhaps one night
beneath starlit sky, one brief morning
of sun and fresh breeze...

But they would never know more.  I was thankful
they had each other to cuddle as life ebbed.

Wondered if we are fooling ourselves,
comforted with philosophy and physics,
with our observations, theories, and Nobel Prizes.

Could it be we are as sightless as hatchlings,
perhaps not even as fortunate as the ones
I held in my hands?

For we forget to gaze upon the constellations,
forget to relish sun and clouds, moon and stars,
in fact, close the curtains at noon and night ...

and we often die alone.


Margaret Bednar, March 30, 2019

This is written for "Imaginary Garden with Real Toads - Physics with Bjorn - Cosmology & Expanding Horizons"