Texas history

there we sat, in air-conditioned classroom, crammed
into desks into rows; this tennis coach-teacher insistent
if not passionate about a dusty battle for glory fort, right
there still, in our hometown. living easy and far from that
rough bloody battle. except. we knew movie heroics,
lines in the sand. we knew how to wave a flag,
cheer the team, fear the other. still do

I recently ran across a contest prompt on the theme of San Antonio history, which sent me right back to 7th grade and the Alamo.

raindrops, tulips, eggs

on a day when pear-bloom carpets
the drive, strawberries wide-eyed, grateful
we pay for the sun again in the way
we bought it with months of gray

why should it make me glad
that thunder-clap, downpour tapering
to gentle plash—I am remembering
the cracked-earth thirst of South Texas

how we turned our faces to warm rain
after breathless hours of cloud-watching
(will they, won’t they stop here or hurtle past
like the tankers on 281)

perhaps there’s no mystery:
it’s fiesta-time, now, in my hometown
bluebonnets gone in their mayfly-life
so we chase and embrace it

and here the redbuds held tight
child tulips upright, spared for tomorrow

Planting with Natives

twenty years from Texas
and still the itch to set out
winter tomatoes
transplanted gardener’s gaze
forlorn on wind-whipped snow-fields

Great Depression Love Story

Everything dust but his cool words

in the diner, that just-different drawl

that marked him as from not-around-here.

A tall drink of water, hair dark beneath hat

and if his frame was rail-lean yet the sinew

was tough and railroad work demanded

muscle. He talked to you (he loved to talk),

charm reinforced by the monotonous

backdrop: bleached-dry tumbleweed

ranchland, scraggled ranks of prickly pear.

Your courting not about picture shows,

fast cars, stolen touches; only coffee

and maybe pie, sweet talk and dreams

of a lush green future, anywhere else.

 

Inspired by this dVerse Poets Pub prompt, writing about family history.