Thanksgiving Day – A poem

I don’t share much of myself here. But I do believe I should and will try to open up more….I’ve no secrets 🙂

Today, while searching for some other poetry, I came across one of my own poems! Wow! Yeah, I wrote poetry for many years. Essays too. Published in small journals (big in Canada but small comparatively). I had a head on me as big as a moose and really thought that “I was it”. Ah, the vagrancies and lightness of being – that is youth!

However, the poem is about Thanksgiving. Also, quite autobiographical and from my own lonely youth on the farm, living close to nature and enjoying my Mom’s wonderful turkey dinners each Oct. (yes, in Canada Thanksgiving is Oct. ).

So here it is. Just enjoy it. I’ve no more pretense about being a “poet”. ……

THANKSGIVING DAY

I remember well
those bright dead days of autumn,
how my brother, the great white hunter
crushed the wee head of the partridge
he had winged.
Crushed it slow and rythmically
with the heel of his heavy boot.

How the farmer, ‘cross the road
filled the burlap sack
with sure and steady hand.
Filled it with a litter of pups
and flung it into the
cold clear water of the crick.

I remember
how my grandpa, at the dinner table
sucked and gummed his turkey
with intense joy and abandon.
The juices edging out the sides
of his eager, hungering mouth.

How my young friends and I
squatted over the chilled stiff fly
and with the delicate hands
of surgeons or lovers to be,
slowly one by one
pulled each leg out from under
its soft blue body.

I remember well
those cool receding days of autumn.
I remember so I give my thanks.
My thanks not a sacrifice to a glaring Moloch
but only,
thanks that I am a man
and not anything else.

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ddeubel

Teacher trainer, technology specialist, educational thinker...creator of EFL Classroom 2.0, a social networking site for thousands of EFL / ESL teachers and students around the world.

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1 Response

  1. November 26, 2009

    […] This post was mentioned on Twitter by eflclassroom, David Deubelbeiss. David Deubelbeiss said: Here is my Thanksgiving poem. http://ddeubel.edublogs.org/2009/11/26/thanksgiving-day-a-poem/ […]

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