Bob Mccrae Poem by Liilia Talts Morrison

Bob McCrae lived at the Matanzas
He gave me flax seeds that didn't grow
He's long since gone back to Kansas
Where summer flax and skies are blue.

I was to paint the cover
Of a book that he would write
Of two kids in the flax fields
Who held to love so tight.

I saw the Kansas prairie
In his pale and watered eyes
I saw the sea of blue flax
As they cried their young goodbyes.

Neither flax nor mustard seed
Can prosper on Espanola Way
The sun, the feet, the whiskey
Make them wither in a day.

Many are the seeds we planted
On that Way
Many are the dreams that ended
As footsteps turned to clay.

And though the book's not written
Except in Bob's own heart
And none will see the cover
Of fields as blue as larks

I still can see him walking
With purpose and strong gait
As he did so many times before.
But now it is too late.