Well, now\u2013 It was in the spring of \u201849 just \u2018round
Memorial Day in the Land O\u2019 Freedom\u2026 or so they
call it. Anyways, I was sittin\u2019 up behind them hills\u2026
Y\u2019know, nexta where God \u2018n\u2019 Hell musta had some
sorta fuss or \u2018nother. Sorta desert. Sorta not.
And I was pannin\u2019 fer rhymes\u2013 I kept comin\u2019 up dry\u2013
when alluvasudden straight outta the ground there\u2019s
this tinklin\u2019, twinklin\u2019 musical sound. So I grabbed me
a panful and gave it a twitch. Some verbs and an adjective
peppered the dish. Good stuff, I s\u2019pose. Fer a yarn they\u2019d
bin fine, but not fer perfessional-lookers-fer-rhymes.
I swished \u2018em a little and shook \u2018em again to see if that
tinklin\u2019 mightn\u2019t be kin to the one that I found in the gully
that night. It\u2019d had to be good, or it wouldn\u2019t fit right.
Them poets won\u2019t shell-out fer less than a pair cuz one
by itself leaves \u2018em pullin\u2019 their hair. So ya gotta find more
than a couple that fit or poets \u2018ll fake it and some \u2018ll just quit
and some \u2018ll just hope no one says that it\u2019s\u2026 Y\u2019 know\u2026
Call \u2018emselves “nou-veau” and claim it\u2019s legit.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u2018Nuffa that, I s\u2019pose.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
I looks fer them twinklin\u2019 musical words that rhymes like
the first time they\u2019s ever been heard. I sure ain\u2019t the first one
that\u2019s panned in them hills. My pappy before me turned up
a few thrills and somewhere or \u2018nother done found a whole line.
But me, I ain\u2019t happy unless it\u2019ll rhyme. They\u2019re there, I can
hear \u2018em\u2013 they tickle the breeze! I\u2019ll stick it out long as there\u2019s
poets to please. If y\u2019 expected a yarn, or to hear miners cuss\u2013
I\u2019s pannin\u2019 fer rhymes and not dirt in the dust!<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Hmph, what\u2019s that ya got there?<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Well, now\u2013 It was in the spring of \u201849 just \u2018roundMemorial Day in the Land O\u2019 Freedom\u2026 or so theycall it. Anyways, I was sittin\u2019 up behind them hills\u2026Y\u2019know, nexta where God \u2018n\u2019 Hell musta had somesorta fuss or \u2018nother. Sorta desert. Sorta not.And I was pannin\u2019 fer rhymes\u2013 I kept comin\u2019 up dry\u2013when alluvasudden … Read More<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2151","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-poetry"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pa867U-yH","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/underwoodpress.com\/ruescribe\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2151","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/underwoodpress.com\/ruescribe\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/underwoodpress.com\/ruescribe\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/underwoodpress.com\/ruescribe\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/underwoodpress.com\/ruescribe\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2151"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/underwoodpress.com\/ruescribe\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2151\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2163,"href":"https:\/\/underwoodpress.com\/ruescribe\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2151\/revisions\/2163"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/underwoodpress.com\/ruescribe\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2151"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/underwoodpress.com\/ruescribe\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2151"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/underwoodpress.com\/ruescribe\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2151"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
Kevin Taylor is a Western Canadian poet, storyteller and accidental lexicographer. First published in 1974. Several chapbooks slouch on his bookshelf where they mark “the sudden grey of decades passing.”<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"