This is my entry for Week 7 of LJ Idol, Season 10 (
therealljidol). This week's topic is "Where I'm From.
Grassroots
Always the green. Low-hipped hills
ripe for farming. At times
a blue-gray river would wend through.
My DNA calls out to river loam. My
people plant themselves in valley,
filled with fertile hillocks. Always.
First, the mild damp of Ullster
the lakes and forests of Suwalki
Hessia's hilly lands along the Rhine
herb gardens of Berkshire.
From there to:
Virginia's winding Shenandoah Valley
mountain rivers of Schuylkill County,
Chester County's temperate, rich soil.
Always the trees, be they pine or sassafras.
Always the harvest, of wheat or coal.
Always the water: brook or uncharted lake.
Whether Buchanan, Weaver or Eutsler,
whether Suchoki, Praznoski, Gwiazdowski,
whether Yoder, Hampton or Hinkle,
whether Pennock, Mendenhall or Marshall,
something in them called out
for earth and water. Perhaps our very
clay demanded it, our saturated selves.
To be somewhere the eye could fall on green,
above coal slag or cobblestone; the spirit
to swim free in a groundswell of home.
- January 31, 2017
therealljidol). This week's topic is "Where I'm From.Grassroots
Always the green. Low-hipped hills
ripe for farming. At times
a blue-gray river would wend through.
My DNA calls out to river loam. My
people plant themselves in valley,
filled with fertile hillocks. Always.
First, the mild damp of Ullster
the lakes and forests of Suwalki
Hessia's hilly lands along the Rhine
herb gardens of Berkshire.
From there to:
Virginia's winding Shenandoah Valley
mountain rivers of Schuylkill County,
Chester County's temperate, rich soil.
Always the trees, be they pine or sassafras.
Always the harvest, of wheat or coal.
Always the water: brook or uncharted lake.
Whether Buchanan, Weaver or Eutsler,
whether Suchoki, Praznoski, Gwiazdowski,
whether Yoder, Hampton or Hinkle,
whether Pennock, Mendenhall or Marshall,
something in them called out
for earth and water. Perhaps our very
clay demanded it, our saturated selves.
To be somewhere the eye could fall on green,
above coal slag or cobblestone; the spirit
to swim free in a groundswell of home.
- January 31, 2017
- Current Mood:
peaceful
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- Alyce Wilson, Poet, Writer and Editor
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Comments
For a short time, my sister lived in Leesburg, Virginia, and I was tickled to see how much that landscape reminded me of Central Pennsylvania, where we grew up.
I remember the pangs of homesickness I once felt while watching a TV show scene filmed in a forest near Vancouver, B.C. The greenish-yellow light in the woods was so uniquely "home," and something I hadn't done more than visit for almost two decades by then.
Edited at 2017-02-04 02:20 am (UTC)
How wonderful to be so in touch with your heritage, to know where you're from, where your roots and your blood have been.
Brava!