A CARDINAL IN THE SNOW

I see a cardinal in the snow,

His bright red plumage seems to glow.

Ruffled feathers, conserving heat,

He searches for a crumb to eat.

I dare to think I save his life,

And strew some seeds upon the ice.

Ice will melt, snow will fade,

And he will fly one more day.

Spring will bring a cardinal wife,

Their bond will foster fresh new life.

From my few small seeds of corn

Generations may yet be born.

(Copyright 2015 Ken Ragan)

DREAMS FROM A DINER

Outside curtained windows

Morning sun illuminates

In certain hope

The dreams of little girls.

Faded lace shatters virgin sunlight

Into hopeless splintered shards

Projected on a diner wall.

Did I ever dream?

I think I did.

I see dreams in the distance now,

Through a smoky saffron haze

Like the dirty yellow of once-white walls,

Knowing I shall never dream again.

What was I to be?

It seems so far away.

A nurse or, (remembering), an artist.

I surely didn't dream of waiting tables;

Of too-large hips, too-small tips,

Green Dacron uniforms, and feet that hurt;

Using this bright/bleak day to buy one more,

Each with the sameness of gray vinyl tiles

That march in dumb monotony

Across the tread-worn floor.

I dream now only of sleep and,

(dream of dreams) Not to dream.

Copyright 2002 Ken Ragan

COUNTRY CHURCH

The mile-long trek was made each week

Down gravel road beside a creek,

To a one room church, faded, plain

At farthest end of a shaded lane.

Each Sunday saw the faithful few

Take their places in time-worn pews.

Benediction and a few old hymns

And the weekly service would begin.

The preacher is a simple man,

Yesterday he plowed his land.

Tomorrow he will once more toil,

Callused hands in rocky soil.

But today he is transfigured

Into something wiser, bigger;

Flushed and sweating is his visage,

Fire and brimstone is his message.

The Word in hand, he paces there,

Accusing eyes, disheveled hair;

Countenance stern, his voice resounds

To farthest corners of holy ground.

Foot washings from time to time,

Strange tongues and testifying.

Cool baptisms on summer days

At sparkling streams in morning haze.

With the sacred word delivered

And after altar call for sinners,

Dinner is laid upon the ground,

Where food and fellowship abound.

Souls uplifted, grace attained,

Folks resume hard life again.

Returning back to homes and farms

Families walking arm in arm.

Melancholy stirs my mind,

Transports me to a simpler time.

Memories strum a plaintive dirge,

And I go back to that country church.

(copyright 2008 Ken Ragan)

 THE ROOSTER

     There were inherent dangers in being an eight-year-old boy that I felt unable to communicate to the rest of the family.  Most particularly, it all had to do with grandma's big red rooster and the fact that I felt betrayed by my own bodily functions.

     In that summer of 1948, my parents had sent me to stay with grandma on her farm in the foothills of the Missouri Ozarks, and it sure was different from my home in St. Louis.  The school term was over in the city and, with Dad recently laid off at the factory, I understood my visit was not solely for pleasure.  I didn't really mind being here though.  In most ways I was actually enjoying the change from city life.  My only problem was that rooster.

     Grandpa had died of pneumonia three years before.  Now it was just grandma and the last of her nine children, Cecil and Beverly, left to eke a meager existence from the always-poor farm.  Cecil was eleven and Bev was five.  I saw nothing unusual in the fact that I had an uncle four years older and an aunt three years younger than I was.

     I loved my grandmother very much, and I know she loved me--in a kind of quiet, understated way.  She was a no-nonsense rural woman, so there were never many kisses or affectionate embraces.  But she would seldom pass by me in the course of the day without tousling my hair or squeezing my shoulder gently.  She always seemed to know if I was troubled or hurt and knew better than anyone how to make things better.

     My favorite place on the farm was the orchard, on a hill overlooking the west side of the house, where I would eat green apples while perched on a branch if my special tree.  From here I had an unobstructed view of the entire farm; southward past the barn lot and unkempt livestock fields to the spring-fed creek lined with willows; eastward across the roof of the big house to the small garden and farther on to dense forest below steep, wooded hills.  To the north (and I hated to even look in that direction) lay the wire-fenced back yard with a gate opening into the chicken yard, populated with 18 or 20 hens and a sharp-spurred old red rooster.  A dusty 150 yard foot path from the gate neatly bisected the chicken yard and ended square in front of the wooden outhouse.  All in all, it was a pretty neat place for a boy to spend the summer.

     Problem was, that darn rooster thought he owned the chicken yard and every time I went in there he would try to prove it.  Extending his wings and ruffling his neck feathers, the bird would charge and send me running in panic to the nearest of the two exits.

     After the first couple of encounters with Old Red, I avoided the chicken yard whenever possible.  We two combatants would eye each other warily through the wire fence, with the rooster strutting and posturing to assert his dominance.  It seemed to me that Old Red was as big as I was and that the big bird looked at me almost eye-to-eye--and the rooster had spurs that could punch holes in my skin.  It just wasn't a fair fight.

     Most of the time I had no reason to venture into the chicken yard, but there were times when a confrontation could not be avoided.  With the outhouse being situated at the far end of the lot, I was forced to go through there at least once every day.  I had no problems with taking a pee now and then.  I could always sneak off behind the barn to relieve myself, and I learned to make it my last business of the day to visit the outhouse--at dusk when the rooster was safely inside the chicken house for the night.  But even with all my careful planning, there were a few occasions when I simply had no choice.  I came to dread that unmistakable pang in my gut during daylight hours.  I thought about slipping off into the woods and squatting in the dry leaves there, but mental images of a snake biting my bare rump quickly dispelled that idea. 

     I suspected that grandma knew of my skirmishes with Old Red.  Once I almost told her about my problem.  The two of us were alone on the front porch one hot afternoon, she on a cane-bottomed chair and I seated on the ledge of the screened porch.  She always wore a bibless apron over a faded cotton print dress.  She sat with a pile of string beans on her spread apron, snapping them in two pieces with a practiced motion and simultaneously pulling away the strings.  She then dropped them into a large metal cooking pot at her feet.  I was constantly amazed at the way her hands worked almost with a mind of their own.  Her brilliant blue eyes could give you their full attention from behind rimless glasses while the hands never missed a beat with the beans.  We sat that way for what seemed like a long time, not talking much--she busy with her chore and me trying to decide how best to present my predicament.  Just when I had worked up the nerve to tell her, Cecil came crashing through the screen door yelling about the cow getting out, and the moment passed.  I was ashamed to admit in front of Cecil (my hero) that I was afraid of a chicken.

     So, at those times when I realized I couldn't wait until dusk, I would watch from the back porch of the house until Old Red was at the farthest angle of interception and sneak up to the gate, from there to make a mad dash to the safety of the outhouse.  Sometimes I made it without incident, but other times the rooster would be hot on my heels.  Once, amid a flurry of feathers and squawking, Old Red's spurs actually struck the back of my leg just before gaining refuge in the outhouse, leaving an angry red welt on my calf.  I was thankful for the denim overalls I wore or it might have been worse.  Even when I made it to the wooden building without a chase, I knew I still had to face the return trip.

    

This state of undeclared war between me and Old Red might have gone on through the summer unchanged, with the rooster holding the upper hand, if not for a totally unexpected encounter that occurred one July morning.

     A thunderstorm had passed through late in the night, leaving the early morning gray and overcast.  After a breakfast of grandma's biscuits and gravy, I went out on the back porch, noticing that the damp and relative darkness had kept the chickens in the shelter of the chicken house.  The rain had stopped and I felt I could safely make a trip to the outhouse.

     I walked through the gate and a few steps down the path when I spotted a slight movement on the ground next to the fence in the farthest corner from the chicken house.  I approached cautiously, and as I got nearer, saw a baby bird which had apparently fallen out of the nest during the wind of the storm.  I thought the nest must be in one of the cedars that lined the fence row.  I got close enough to stoop and pick up the flightless baby, seeing the agitated parent bird chirping loudly from a nearby branch.  Finding the nest, I saw that I could just reach it through the prickly foliage.  Standing on tiptoe and extending my arm to its fullest limit, I managed to place the little bird back in its nest.  Totally absorbed in this task and feeling quite satisfied with myself, I turned from the fence and found myself face to face with Old Red.  I was cornered, nowhere to run.  The rooster stood between me and any means of escape.

     It all happened so quickly that I had no time to think or plan my actions.  As the big rooster charged, I hollered in mindless fright, expelling all the air in my lungs in a loud scream.  I kicked with my feet and flailed wildly with my arms, feeling my balled-up fist strike Old Red's tough, leathery comb.  Surprised by my loud yell and the swat on his head, the rooster retreated about ten feet from me and stopped, making a low chuckling sound in its throat.

     Feeling a tentative rush of nerve at my unexpected victory, I took a couple of steps toward Old Red, yelling and flapping my arms.  The rooster backed off warily.  More daring now, I charged at the rooster, again waving my arms and yelling.  Old Red went in full retreat, flapping his wings and trying to elude the attack.  I couldn't believe it.  The big red rooster was actually afraid of me.  I made several more experimental charges at him with the results always the same.  Giddy with the new feeling of bravery, I might have spent the whole day in that chicken yard antagonizing Old Red, except that I heard grandma call to me from the back porch.  When I came in the house she scolded me soundly for "botherin’ my rooster". But she couldn't hide a little smile as she turned away.

     Later that day, when I felt like it was safe to approach her, I asked grandma if I could be the one to go out to the chicken house and collect the eggs every morning.  She said I could.

HOW I ACQUIRED JACKIE ROBINSON

     I was born in 1941. At around the age of nine, I became obsessed with collecting baseball cards. Jackie Robinson and Larry Doby had broken the "color line" in major league baseball by my sixth birthday, and I was childishly unaware of the social change that had taken place in my favorite sport. I only knew that I didn't much like Jackie Robinson, not because he was black, but because he was a thorn in the side of my home town St. Louis Cardinals. Every time the Cardinals and Dodgers played, Jackie Robinson seemed to do something to beat us--steal a base, make a great defensive play, or come up with a key hit. None of this however, diminished my desire to acquire the Jackie Robinson baseball card. I had Reese and Cox, Furillo and Maglie, Snider and Hodges, but even though every nickel I got was spent on baseball cards, Robinson wasn't in my collection. I must have chewed pounds of the flat, brittle pink gum contained in those packs of baseball cards before I finally found "Jackie Robinson, Second Base, Brooklyn Dodgers." There he was in the middle of four other now-forgotten players, covered with that whitish powder (flour?) that kept the cards and gum from sticking together. He wasn't segregated or specially marked and the other cards didn't seem to mind his being there. He was just another baseball card to add to my collection. I realize that life was lived in a simpler time and place for kids then, and I had not learned words like prejudice and bigotry. It was only as an adult that I came to know of the rigors and hardships Jackie Robinson endured during those childhood years of mine. His        selfless contributions to the game of baseball would pave the way for generations of African-American players who followed him. I was fortunate enough to see Jackie play at the old Sportsman's Park in St. Louis, but I don't think he noticed the white kid in the stands. I wonder if he would have seen me as just another kid.

Copyright 2005 Ken Ragan

Wayne County Christmas

December, 1946 was exceptionally cold in Wayne County Missouri.  Or at least, that’s how I remember it.  I didn’t know it then, but hard times had taken me there.  My parents were in St. Louis with my brother Keith, born in June of that year.  I had hardly even gotten used to him. Dad was unemployed and putting food on the table had become a daunting task.  It was determined that the burden would be lightened if I spent some time with grandma Wilson on her subsistence farm near Greenville.  Describing this setting as a farm does not accurately reflect reality.  Livestock consisted of a few chickens and one milk cow along with a small vegetable patch.  That was the farm.

 Greenville is and was the county seat of Wayne County, had then and still has a population of about 500. Grandma’s house was situated about a mile from town as the crow flies. 

I joined a family there comprised of Grandma Bessie Wilson, my uncle Cecil (4years my elder), and my aunt Beverly (only a year-and-a-half old).  My grandfather, Clarence Madison Wilson, had died in the spring of the year.  So, it had thus far been a pretty eventful year for me, and Christmas was coming.

I was not uncomfortable in or unfamiliar with my new surroundings.  I loved my grandmother and I knew she loved me.  I had often visited here with my parents and, while Bev was still very young and I had not interacted with her to a great degree, I looked up to and liked Uncle Cecil.  He had sometimes taken me with him to shoot squirrels or to fish the nearby creek.  I had played with my cousins on warm summer days in the big front yard on many previous occasions.

The chore of finding and cutting a Christmas tree was delegated to Cecil and me.  It was mostly Cecil, because as a six-year-old, I really didn’t do much except tag along.  I remember trekking the hilly landscape of the Ozark foothills with him, tramping in the bitter cold through tufts of golden-brown sage grass looking for the perfect cedar tree.  When we found one of the appropriate size, Cecil lay on his back and sawed down the five-foot specimen and we dragged it back to the house.

Decorating the tree was done one evening in the “front room”, basking in the warmth of a pot-bellied stove.  Grandma had popped a lot of corn and she used a needle and thread to string strands of popcorn.  The popcorn had a lightly burnt smell that was not unpleasant.  There were also popcorn balls made with sorghum and honey.  A cardboard star was affixed to the top of the tree.  There were, of course, no lights, since electricity had not yet arrived in the suburbs of Greenville. The finished product was placed in the corner, near the battery-powered Philco radio, almost in the exact spot once occupied by grandpa Wilson’s rocking chair. 

Christmas dawned cold and clear.  I could smell the scents of breakfast from my featherbed.  Cecil had chopped and brought in wood for the stove and I had brought in kindling.  Grandma presided over the kitchen and cooked biscuits, gravy and eggs on the cast-iron wood stove.

My Christmas gifts on that Wednesday morning were a stocking containing an orange, some hard candy and a nickel.  I couldn’t wait to spend that nickel.  By today’s standards, we would be considered poor, but I don’t think we realized it. 

 The best gift of all came later that week when mom, dad, and my little brother came for a visit.
(copyright 2011 Ken Ragan)

IN MY DREAM

In my dream, it is dusk.

The lake is glassy calm.

A haze floats on the water,

And I am suspended there.

The scent of pine and lavender

Hangs lightly in the air.

I am alone, as I should be,

And it is strangely pleasant.

No sound strikes my ear.

My eyes see only gray.

I have no urge to speak.

I am unmoving, still.

I am not frightened.

I am not drowning.

I am not cold.

I simply am.

  I cannot see the shore.

The sun is nearly gone.

I know that night is near.

Will I see the dawn….

In my dream?

Copyright 2016 Ken Ragan

THE FAMILY TREE

A family is a tree,

Branches spreading far.

Uncounted sprigs and twigs,

And mighty limbs that soar.

We cannot know them all,

Or count their many leaves.

Know the secret workings,

Retrieve their hidden keys.

Below the arching grandeur

Are gnarled and tangled roots,

Extending ever deeper,

Sustaining precious fruits.

To know the true beginning

Of a complex family tree,

We need only look

To the One who plants the seed.

(copyright 2014 Ken Ragan)

GRANDMA’S WHISKERS

A few days ago, as I was absorbed in one of the more unpleasant tasks that come with aging (the incessant battle with incursions of hair growth in unwanted places like ears and nose) I was, for the first time in a very long time, reminded of one memorable evening spent with Grandma Wilson.

        It may surprise some to learn that Grandma was a bit vain about her appearance, especially when she would go to church on Sunday.  She always had a great complexion, even into her later years, a feature she attributed to Ivory Soap and Oil of Olay.  So, Saturday evenings would sometimes involve the plucking of a few chin whiskers.  It was an almost weekly ritual.  She would gather her mirror and tweezers and situate herself on the couch beside a window in the “front room”.   As a kid, I found this to be a fascinating spectacle and I watched with rapt attention.

        On one occasion she had some difficulty holding the mirror steady enough to clearly see the tiny hairs.  She asked me   to hold the mirror and I eagerly obliged, happy to be included.  It was briefly effective, but she soon tired of it and said she couldn’t see well enough to continue.  I told her she had missed a couple of the whiskers, my young eyes a bit sharper than hers.  It was then that she asked me if I could take the tweezers and pluck the stubborn remainders.  

        I am amazed at the clarity of this memory, these many years later.  I remember how the tweezers felt in my hand and the ease by which the whisker came free of her skin.  I remember the smile on her face when I had accomplished what was, to me, a wondrous feat.

        It was only a couple of times that I had this particular interaction with her.  It must sound kind of strange, but it is one of my favorite memories of the Grandma I adored.

FOR MAHALA

She left this world before we came

To see that time erased her name

From the stone that marked her rest

Upon an ancient wooded crest.

Unrequired was graven stone

To make her earthly presence known.

Her strength of spirit long endured

Though the name had been obscured.

Relentless time is unforgiving;

It only burdens us, the living.

We scribe her name in stone once more

“For a loved one gone before”.

(copyright 2017 Ken Ragan)

A Cat Tale My uncle, Cecil Wayne Wilson, was one heck of a marksman with a .22 rifle. I was privileged to accompany him on a few squirrel hunting safaris when I was about seven or eight years old.   Those excursions would usually take place on a crisp fall morning, after the hickory nuts had reached full maturity.

                                               

He only allowed me to go with him if I promised to be absolutely quiet and to obey his instructions.  Of course, I would have promised him anything as long as he let me go.  The woods behind grandma’s house extended for several square miles and he had a few favorite places to stalk the furry little creatures.  When we reached a spot to his liking, he would position my backside beside a tree and warn me to be quiet. 

Thus would begin my squirrel education.  If he saw an unwary critter nearby, it was lights out for the little guy.  If a squirrel saw us, it would skitter behind a tree trunk.  Cecil would tell me, “Now watch him.  He will just go around to the other side and peek out to see if we are still here.”  Sure enough, it went just like he said, and there was one more dead squirrel.

Sometimes, the squirrels weren’t very plentiful and he had a special way of calling them.  Most people have heard of duck calls or deer calls, but Cecil had a unique way of calling squirrels.  He would hold two half dollar coins apart with a finger of one hand use the other hand to snap the coins together, making a clicking sound.  Eventually one of them couldn’t resist checking it out and you can guess the result.  Cec seldom missed and he furnished himself and grandma with squirrel for supper.  I never could summon the courage to try squirrel, probably because I was horrified the first time I saw grandma crack the head to retrieve the brains and cook them with eggs for breakfast.

The squirrel narrative is only prologue to the point of this story.  One fine day Cecil and I had the .22 out behind the root cellar practicing our shooting (Mostly his, but he let me have a shot occasionally.)  While we were there grandma’s old cat sauntered by.  Before I

even knew it happened, Cecil shot the tail off that cat slick as a whistle.  Pop!  The tail went one way and the cat took off like a shot in the other direction.  Well we didn’t see hide nor hair of the cat for several days, but it eventually showed up and grandma couldn’t understand what had happened to the cat’s tail.  She doctored the stump of a tail with turpentine and after a while the cat seemed none the worse for wear.

Some thirty years later, when grandma was staying in a residential care facility in Poplar Bluff, I came to visit her and, by chance, Cecil happened to be there as well.  As the conversation among us progressed, I asked Cecil if he remembered shooting the tail off that cat.  Grandma sat straight up in her chair and exclaimed, “Cecil, did you shoot that cat’s tail off?”  Cecil smiled a sort of half smile and replied sheepishly, ‘Yeah, Mom, I did.”  It was only then that she learned the truth about the old cat’s tail.

Deities

I wonder at the deities

Who inhabit immortality.

Allah, Jesus, Adonai,

Of the many, they but three

Humans choose to glorify.

Do they co-exist in harmony

Or spend forever stormily

Decrying each the other’s teaching,

Lightning, thunder in their armory,

Epithets and enmity increasing?

What a raucous atmosphere

Must be routinely displayed there

As they blaspheme, judge and shout,

Each insistent to declare

Their worshippers are most devout.

It could explain how we on earth

Learned to hate and kill and curse

Brothers sharing gods' creation,

Different only by their birth,

All intent on condemnation.

Copyright 2015 --Ken Ragan