God knows how our neighbor managed to breed
His great sow:
Whatever his shrewd secret, he kept it hid

In the same way
He kept the sow--impounded from public stare,
Prize ribbon and pig show.

But one dusk our questions commended us to a tour
Through his lantern-lit
Maze of barns to the lintel of the sunk sty door

To gape at it:
This was no rose-and-larkspurred china suckling
With a penny slot

For thrift children, nor dolt pig ripe for heckling,
About to be
Glorified for prime flesh and golden crackling

In a parsley halo;
Nor even one of the common barnyard sows,
Mire-smirched, blowzy,

Maunching thistle and knotweed on her snout-
cruise--
Bloat tun of milk
On the move, hedged by a litter of feat-foot ninnies

Shrilling her hulk
To halt for a swig at the pink teats. No. This vast
Brobdingnag bulk

Of a sow lounged belly-bedded on that black
compost,
Fat-rutted eyes
Dream-filmed. What a vision of ancient hoghood
must

Thus wholly engross
The great grandam!--our marvel blazoned a knight,
Helmed, in cuirass,

Unhorsed and shredded in the grove of combat
By a grisly-bristled
Boar, fabulous enough to straddle that sow's heat.

But our farmer whistled,
Then, with a jocular fist thwacked the barrel nape,
And the green-copse-castled

Pig hove, letting legend like dried mud drop,
Slowly, grunt
On grunt, up in the flickering light to shape

A monument
Prodigious in gluttonies as that hog whose want
Made lean Lent

Of kitchen slops and, stomaching no constraint,
Proceeded to swill
The seven troughed seas and every earthquaking
continent.

We started out with Armistead
from the shelter of the trees.
A jackrabbit raced past to the rear,
no dumb bunny was he

The heat rose up to meet us
As we started up the rise-
The prospect of the copse of trees
Before us was the prize.

The flower of Virginia here
displayed upon Parade
We must have looked magnificent
Just before the cannonade

They piled on Double Cannister
and tore holes in our line
We staggered from the weight of shot
that fearful hissing whine..

Then enfilading fire came
From the Yanks behind stone walls
Just then post fences six feet high
briefly caused our charge to stall

Brave **** Gannett was unhorsed
Upon this very spot
Kemper, wounded mortally,
Was retrieved from shell and shot


We made it past the final fence
And up the grassy knoll
Defiant in the cannons mouth
"Turn those guns!" I'm told.

But at that very Moment
General Armistead was downed
The attack lost its momentum
Our wave crested on high ground..


The blue bellies yelled Fredericksburg
As the Crimson tide retraced
Half in Anger, Half in relief
that the challenge had been faced.


The hill before the copse of trees
Pocked with our dead and dying
While the remnants of Picketts men
Towards Longstreets line were filing


Matthew Brady took my photograph
before I was led away
My face a study in defiance
A true man of the gray.

We don't choose love
Love chooses us
And I am unhorsed
At the thought of
It's never the right place
Never the right time
Lance splinters in my eye
I am blinded this time
A well-placed blow and
I'm mired in the mud
Hooves in the rush
Pounding hearts
Scoliosis
Beating the wrong names
And places
Under suits of armor
And all the wrong words
Collecting in the dust
We are lucky
If love chooses us
If the battle is lost
And the armor is tossed aside
I'd give my kingdom
For a horse to ride
Fighting and dying
For blood, love and country

The moon shone full that fatal night
When Stonewall and his men
were returning from a scout
around their former friends.
The brightness of the risen moon
Put them in silhouette.
The pickets rose and fired;
an action they would soon regret.
Stonewall Jackson was unhorsed,
a Minnie ball in his arm.
The surgeons had to amputate.
One week later he was gone.
It marred a famous victory,
A masterpiece of Lee’s,
when Jackson crossed over the river
to rest in the shade of the trees.

Whatever ails you, aids you
Even though you are born in
The teeth of poverty;
Work and wait
Even though the world
Applaud or jeers,
Work and wait.

Neither heaven nor earth
Reserve a place for laziness
For in life door it is written,
'Push'
Perhaps, don't feel helpless
Like an unhorsed knight without armour
Work and wait.

Get it right,
You cannot do everything,
But you can do something.
Work and wait:
That, differentiates the artist from artisan.
Falling on your face should not be a worry.
Work and wait.


Do this for opportunity comes
Dressed in work clothes

The plain lies before us,
shimmering in the heat.
The lance is heavy in my hand
My ancient Armour creaks.
Rocinante lets out a snort
and gives the reins a shake.
Is that a giant that stands before us
or just this ancient ones mistake?
We are both old and past our prime;
My faithful horse and me.
I spur old Rocinante forth.
and trust my lance for victory!


Alas, I'm unhorsed by my powerful foe
The windmill has made short work of me.
My pride has been bruised but nothing is broken.
We press onward to destiny.