Pitchforks And Turkey In The Straw* Poem by elysabeth faslund

Your poem reminds me of when I was a young child growing up on the farm. Well done... I enjoyed it very much.

Very interesting. I like this part about the mules. Age, time Anger, pain As seasons fill A huge basket - A huge basket brings Paradise To suspendered, deadened, plow mules. They work the hardest and deserve it. I was lucky once. I thought the mule needed help pulling a long slender tree. I bent to lift it and then stood back a few yards as soon as it started dragging it. Suddenly the mule turned and the tree swung in my direction stopping a few inches from my legs. Ignorance is not always bliss. I like the line: deviled up the chimney too. I couldn't find the turkey in the straw. Reminds me of the time I went to these woods and collected fire wood already laying on the ground - no need for cutting. Then one frosty day I brought in a praying matis' nest (didn't know what it was) and put it on the mantel. When it warmed up, the room was crawling with the little devils. I hated puting them out in the cold knowing that there was no way they could survive. Ahead of their season. Poems fit any time, any age.

Reads like a memorialisation of a country life past - though perhaps not very past. Not quite a celebration though either, but one man's struggle is another man's dream and driver. Warts and all evocative dissection - for it's far from being a simple description - that has great power, deriving from the eloquent and poetic presentation. For the second time in a few days (if it happens again I'm off!) I'm reminded of Jackson Browne's song Our Lady Of The Well - 'where the families work the land As they have always done Oh look how far the other way My country's gone' This country boy was brought up to this kind of life and values it's hardships as much as its simplicity and moments of beauty. A moving read. Thank you. xx jim