Four Poems
by Bob McAfee
Mountain Shelter
I walk alone in the forest,
an uphill climb through the laurel.
My breathing is labored,
but the morning sun warms my bones.
The wind freshens from the north,
a warning of afternoon showers.
The clouds ride high.
I have several hours before the rain.
There is a cabin in the high glen,
empty for as long as local folks remember.
Perhaps a shepherd summered here,
maybe a mountain man’s final shelter.
Rough logs and a tin roof,
not much warmth in winter
but salvation for an innocent
wandering the forest in weather.
I see the shack in the distance.
From the brush at the side of the path
an old tom turkey breaks his cover,
emerging like Robin Hood upon a rich traveler.
He spies me and turns uphill.
He runs as I imagine an ostrich would run,
one foot on the ground every few yards,
striving for flight but unable to achieve takeoff velocity.
We continue this way for a moment,
two Olympic sprinters heading for the tape.
He veers off into the brush past the shack.
I realize the sound I hear is my own laughter.
A few hundred yards more and the trees stop,
high meadow, rough grasses punctuated
by boulders and rock ledges,
fitting desks at which to sit and write my poetry.
I finish my poem and redeposit my notebook
in my backpack which has become a pillow.
I stretch out on the ground while my words
roll around my sleepy mind and echo down the mountain.
With the first explosion I open my eyes,
remember where I am, naked on a hillside,
high point in the lightning zone while
the grasses and boulders lie low and snicker.
Dodging the raindrops and counting
between the flashes and the crashes,
flash 1001, crash too close,
I reach the cabin in the nick of time.
I’m dry in the interior.
The trees well up to protect the cabin.
The tin roof reverberates with every crash.
I hope the flashes cannot find me here.
I imagine the ghost of the shepherd
calming his panicked flock and
wondering why this poor fool is
huddled in his cabin terrified.
The mountain man bursts in the door,
heaves his load of pelts and skins upon the floor,
winks at me in the corner and
turns to build a fire in the stone fireplace.
Later on, the three of us share
the last remains of my instant coffee,
talk about the weather and the mountain,
complain about being alone but remain alone.
The rain has passed, the sun returns,
enough light to make it home.
The three of us depart in our separate dimensions,
each to his own but happily alone.
Things That Fly
The young girl fell from her nest
in the crotch of a Douglas fir atop
the highest ridge on Carter’s Knob
on a morning when the sun was down
and the smoke moved like a snake
through the treetops below her
and the Tuckasegee curled like
a ribbon, the rapids glistening white
in the distance, storm clouds hanging
ominously over her, when her father
was long dead, her mother off hunting
and her own first true love had departed,
she reached the end of the swaying branch,
spread her young wings and launched,
because that’s what young girls do.
*Originally appeared in Port Crow Press (defunct)
Caney Fork
Shuffling slowly down the mountainside
like an old man mindlessly wandering,
playing out its energies
along the roadside pavement,
meandering first on one side
then the other while I wonder
why the road was built between
the outer reaches of its pendulum swings.
The Caney Fork of the Tuckaseegee
is the mirror of me as I slowly descend.
First I’m right then I’m left
as I surge impatiently or linger apace,
defining a space or ignoring a boundary,
pondering aimlessly, an itinerant journeyman,
following the valley to reach a conclusion,
then losing myself in the confluence
of a greater stream.
Vines
Vines cover my body
over and under.
We are one and the same
as we inch along branches,
bear my weight upward
seeking the sunlight,
sinuous, sensuous.
We twist and gnarl
in steady progression.
Leaves and thorns,
wandering tendrils
wrap around tree trunks,
burst through the canopy,
bask in the altitude,
anchored securely below.
BIO: Bob McAfee is a retired software consultant who lives with his wife near Boston. He has written nine books of poetry, mostly on Love, Aging, and the Natural World. For the last several years he has hosted a Wednesday night Zoom poetry workshop. Since 2019, he has had 150 poems selected by 61 different publications. Two poems Nominated for Best of the Net. His website, www.bobmcafee.com, contains links to all his published poetry.