Great picture! Love it.
Here's one from me:
The devolution of yard art is so quintessentially American--and
not in a good way. Pink plastic flamingos, ok. Figurines of black
boys fishing? Fourth of July approaches. How about a life-sized
George Wallace wrapped in the flag in his block-the-doorway-pose?
Put him on a pedestal of limestone with the fossilized bones of those
indigenous folks who in 30,000 years left no footprint but Anasazi habitats.
Yard art was a sub-theme of a poem I wrote 5 or so years ago.
The other stuff edited out, here it is:
God’s Country
. . . .
A spray-painted silhouette cowboy
waves toward the state aid highway
north of Swanville, tilted and rusting
as if finally tired of taming the west.
I often wave back when driving by –
roll down my window and yell How-DEE!
at the top of my voice.
Mostly I feel better for the effort.
This is the land of yard ornaments, power lines
and windmills.
They remind of God’s beneficence,
his unconditional gift of our continent
and all it holds –
the cement-cast elk and bear, once real,
we’re told
like those who lived in symbiosis,
before the buffalo
and the weeds
were cleared.
. . . .
As the sun comes and goes
epoxy deer wait by the pond.
. . . .
Up the road twenty or so miles
a telephone pole painted and feathered –
half buried at an odd angle, to look
like an arrow struck the earth.
Hello from the clouds.
Hello
from Little Crow.
----------------------------------------------------------
Sorry Linda,
Hijack is over.
Cheers.
and have a great 4th.
T