First Crocus!

The first Crocus! YAY! Photo by Mary Stebbins, click on image to view larger. 

Yo Mama's Meatloaf

I made meatloaf for dinner tonight.  Comfort food, plain and simple, and it came out great.  This is always up in the air, since I don't use a recipe.  I did use lots of Dinosaur BBQ sauce.  Mmmm, lip-burning good.

Meat loaf always makes me think of my mother, who used to make meatloaf regularly, who made it special for me because she knew I loved it.  No more though.  At least today she introduced me to people as her daughter and not her mother.

--
I am certain of nothing but the Heart's affections and the truth of the Imagination- John Keats
Mary

blueberry sausage omelette--yum

I just made myself a scrumptious omelette with blueberry sausage, zucchini, shiitake mushrooms, oat cheese and three kinds of peppers.  I'm so sorry you weren't here to share it!  YUM!

--
I am certain of nothing but the Heart's affections and the truth of the Imagination- John Keats
Mary

Dolly Parton and Ansel Adams take on the Rednecks, 1a

Dolly Parton and Ansel Adams Take on the Rednecks

 

Sky stretches overhead.  Dramatic clouds, perfect shadows on the rocks, but Dolly doesn't notice.

When she sees pick up trucks on the horizon, she thinks of a new song.  Underfoot:  clay pigeons, broken

By birdshot or bullets, and one real pigeon, his neck exploded.  The no hunting sign is full

Of holes.  Ansel's on his knees fiddling with f-stops and shutter speeds.  He doesn't notice

the trucks coming or the song Dolly is humming now.  When she begins singing

about forsaken love, thinking about how Ansel is ignoring her,

he says, shhh, you'll scare the heron.  The pick up trucks speed toward them. The first donuts

in the wet field, spraying mud On the Graphlex.  Dolly Parton giggles.  Nervously.  Her breasts jiggle,

but Ansel Adams doesn't notice.  He's wiping mud off with a White hankie.  It's not enough. 

He'd like Dolly's skirt, all that voluminous fabric, but untucks his shirt instead.

The next truck shoots not only mud, but A half-filled beer can.  When it hits the camera The spay

splashes Ansel's face. The third truck is shooting At the first, and red shells pop out the window. 

Buckshot whistles around Ansel Adam's head.   His geese rise from the pond, the heron

lifts from the shoreline.  It's not hunting season, but three of the geese  fall to the ground

around Dolly with plump thuds.  She thinks goose dinner, until one moans,

soft and gurgly.  She rushes over, wants to be sick, wants save it.  But the rednecks

are splashing by again, spraying her dress and the round

flesh above is with mud.  Cold mud.  Dolly shrieks.

She picks up the spare tripod and swings it at the next truck,

cracking the windshield.  She runs toward the third truck,

screaming and waving the tripod.  Through the muddy lens Ansel captures a shot of it, and another

of the truck bearing down on Dolly.  In the last shot, the grill is inches from the Graphlex

And Ansel is airborne, arms akimbo. 

 

Mary Stebbins

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--
I am certain of nothing but the Heart's affections and the truth of the Imagination- John Keats
Mary

Dolly Parton and Ansel Adams take on the Rednecks, 1st draft

Dolly Parton and Ansel Adams take on the rednacks

 

The pick up truck donuts in the wet field, spraying mud

on the Graphlex.  Dolly Parton giggles.  Her breasts jiggle.

Ansel Adams doesn't notice.  He's wipling the mud off with a

white hankie.  It's not enough.  The next truck,

 following behind, shoots not only mud, but

a half-filled beer can.  The spay when it hits the camera

gets Ansel in the face.The third truck is shooting

at the first, and red shells pop out the window. 

Buckshot whistles around Ansel Adam's head.

His geese rise from the pond, the heron from the shoreline.

It's not hunting season, but three of the geese

fall on the ground around Dolly.  The plump thuds

get her attention.  She's thinking goose dinner.

until one moans, soft and gurgly.  She rushes over,

want to be sick, wants help it.  But the rednecks

are splashing by again, spraying her dress and the round

flesh above is with mud.  It's cold, and Dolly shrieks.

She picks up the tripod and swings it at the next truck,

cracking the windsheild.  She runs toward the third truck,

screaming and swinging the tripod.  Ansel gets a shot of it.

Not his nomral thing,but hey.  The shadows he'd wated to capture on the rock above the posn have faded and shifted.

The birds flown, drama gone.  He wishes the rednecks

would slip into the pond and drown, except for the pollution,

But they're still shotting at Dolly.  How could they miss such a target, he wonders, and takes another shot through the muddy lens.

Then the rednecks shoot them both?  Did you expect them to win against such odds?

I painted myself into a corner,  How could unarmed Dolly Parton and Ansel Adams win against three truckloads of rednecks anyway?

--
I am certain of nothing but the Heart's affections and the truth of the Imagination- John Keats
Mary

Cleopatra Entertains Monika Lewinsky

Cleopatra Entertains Monika Lewinsky

 

The fanning drives her nuts.  The terrible soft swishing, the palm

Leaves so full of holes.  Bill is busy with Caesar

Discussing another dumb war, something about Iraq or Iran,

She can never keep them straight.  Various alliances,

Days marches, troops.  Why isn't Hilary here with Cleopatra?

She should be the one making small talk, but she's telling

the men what to do.  And how.  As if they'll listen.

Cleopatra's tan is die for--so dark, darker even

than the one Monika got out of a bottle in 8^th grade. 

Cleopatra doesn't look as much like Elizabeth Taylor

as Monika expected.  Smaller breasts.  Not as much make-up.

Mostly just eye-liner.  Not as much jewelry, either.

Monika stutters; tries to remember what she learned in college

about conversation with queens.  Cleopatra

Speaks to the slave girls who disappear and return with trays.

Monika takes the tea, in its earthenware bowl, but nearly spits

When she tastes it.  Bitter.  Utterly rank.  Don't they have any coke?

Or Root beer?  She wants to ask for ice, but is afraid.  Cleopatra

Doesn't have any, and the she's the queen.  Maybe they've run out.

Her fingers sink into the fruit she lifts warm from the bowl

And cradles in her palm, not wanting to taste it, not wanting to let it

Into her mouth.  The curtains are plain and coarse.  Heavy and still.

And it's so hot.  The slave girl, maybe twelve, fans slowly, slowly. 

She barely moves the air.  Cleopatra drapes an arm, long and lean, over the chaise,

Sucks a plum and then another.  Outside the open window, sand rearranges itself. 

And in the desert, somewhere, that idiot Bush is destroying the world.

 

 

 

 

 

Mary Stebbns

For Patrick Lawler  (when Feeding The Fear comes out) (Not as good though, by any means)  [For Monday's reading challenge, 1^st attempt]

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--
I am certain of nothing but the Heart's affections and the truth of the Imagination- John Keats
Mary

Self-portrait with Orphie

Self-portrait with Orphie, photo by Mary Stebbins--two cameras at once, phew! 

Orphie lookks for signs of spring

Orphie lookks for signs of spring, photo by Mary Stebbins. Click on image to see larger. 

Orphie Rides Shotgun

Orphie Rides Shotgun, by Mary Stebbins. Shari's kitty, Orphan, visits with Aunt Mary. Click on photo to see larger.