home
***
CD-ROM
|
disk
|
FTP
|
other
***
search
/
AOL File Library: 9,200 to 9,299
/
9200.zip
/
AOLDLs
/
Poetry Library 1
/
A Song of the Old South
/
info.txt
< prev
Wrap
Text File
|
2014-12-10
|
2KB
|
50 lines
Subject: A Song of the Old South
Author: Kathie Stehr
Uploaded By: KStehr
Date: 9/14/2002
File: A Song of the Old South.doc (20992 bytes)
Estimated Download Time (23638 baud): < 1 minute
Download Count: 10
Needs: Micorosoft Word
A Song of the Old South
On a trip to Louisiana, I left a piece of my soul,
the romantic magic that lives on the levee.
There, by the snake brown water of the Mississippi,
is a poetic adventure that visits me in dreams.
We were on a history trip, trying to find the grand old south.
Not the kind where you pay and stand behind ropes,
where a sweet old black man tells you lies of Gone with the Wind.
I wanted to find the real ruins to satisfy the senses and feed my imagination.
We found a grand old lady overgrown in an oil field.
My racing heart ignored trespassing warnings.
A crumbling giant with a darkening stage for my characters,
a faτade, the ruins breathing a captivating eerie quality.
Here there had been days of glory and riches,
followed by a long night of war and disaster.
I picked my way through an empty doorway,
I heard the whispers, looking for an age long ago.
I tried the crumbling steps and twisted my ankle.
I felt a silken gown brush past me on her way up the stairs.
The beauty transcended the decay, tender wrinkles of time.
All lost in a pattern of light and shadows of yesterdays.
And the mighty Mississippi continues to flow on,
eroding the banks; the destroyer, the serpentine.
She continues through the magnolia moonlight nights,
As ghosts of old fears and joys forever haunt us.
By Kathie Stehr April 2002
___
DGM