POETRY BY H.L. DOWLESS

H.L. Dowless is a thirty-five year veteran writer. He loves traveling, warm puppies, horses, Glenda, 68 to 72 Chevy pickup trucks, deer, bear, buffalo hunting, nice land tracts, writing, working in exotic locations abroad, and living life on the edge in general.

I’M A PROSPECTOR

I’m a prospector,
A man of old,
With my German Shepherd dog
And my mule by my side,
As I slosh pan for hidden gold.

Got my coffee pot inside my bag,
Got my rice
And my bean sack;
With my pemmican
And dried jerky I carried along
My meals are ever so nice!

Neath a full moon by the cactus out in the open air,
In front of my pack tent
And my bedroll,
I sit upon a log whining on the harmonica
When I have time to spare;
I swear
The night air
Must be good for the soul!

From a wild gourd and a stalk of cottonwood
I crafted a banjo.
I strum on the junkyard scrounged piano strings
In such a manner as to hex all of my listeners
With a head-swooning mojo.

My alms dish sits before them
Upon a neat natural granite pedestal;
Soon it’s completely filled to the rim
With beautiful ruby and emerald pretzel.

I play all night long,
We laugh many a hearty laugh,
We device many a cheer-filled song,
Many a whiskey cheer we all did simultaneously cast,
This motley company of outlasted souls
Searching in earnest for a space where we can belong.

I might spend a year in a single place,
Or I may even spend two,
When my prospective gold vein doesn’t bear fruit,
Then back to that trail
Unto which my feet still hold true;
Moving forward into a peach sun rise
With a golden celestial hope for the new dawning day.

I DREAM OF COURTING YOU AGAIN

I relish the day,
The bright morning sunlight,
The old two rut woods way
Winding along through multicolored wildflowers
So far out of sight.

There stood this wood-framed cabin by the side,
With an open porch and some tied bottom chairs;
We all used to sit about there
And thrive,
Reminiscing amid the azalea and rose blossoms swaying
About in the blustery air.

Your father rocked backward and forward on that porch,
Smoking his South Carolina hand rolled peach cigar,
Donned in his leather riding boots,
Gray calico bandolier Fedora and tuxedo
Of course,
As he attempted to speak eloquently about a possibility of life
On some distant Orion star.

As the sounds of sledgehammers striking,
Hoarsely yelling men,
Roaring engines of every type,
Jackhammers drilling,
Vehicles moving back and forth
Blowing their horns;
Rip all the way through the precious nighttime hours,
I turn over in frustration as I lay upon a thin Styrofoam-filled mat
Spread out on a long since faded hard-wood floor.

A couple of boards are missing in places along the walls,
I feel the puffing witching hour breeze,
I pull the World War I military-surplus wool blanket around me with the incoming chill,
I think about polyethylene plastic solving this problem
With such ease.

There is a sudden heavy flash of sapphire light,
A peal of rolling thunder shakes the entire clap board shack,
A heavy hammer of rain drowns out the street roar in the night,
A drop here and there spots upon my face,
Then rolls down across my eyes and my cheek;
While I dream I’m still courting you
Out on that timeless porch once more again
In that special wild-wood oasis.