Sylvan Lake, Custer State Park

I had planned a different post for today, but I found myself reluctant to leave the Black Hills of South Dakota quite yet so I decided to visit one of my favorite places on earth--Custer State Park.  My family has so many memories of camping, hiking and fishing in this beautiful park.  One year when we were camping there for a week I took my son Michael, who was about three at the time, on a hike and we ended up at log cabin where poet Badger Clark once lived.  A pair of his boots were on display, and for whatever reason the boots made a huge impression with my young son, and we spent the rest of the week 'hunting' for Badger Clark.  Michael would see a cabin or shelter and run up to it, shouting "Badger Clark, Badger Clark, I know where your boots are!"  To this day I cannot separate the poet from his boots, and I hope he is somewhere in a heaven that looks like Custer State Park, hiking the trails in his well loved boots.  Here's a beautiful poem of his that I have always loved...I hope you enjoy it too.

A Cowboy's Prayer
(Written for Mother)

Oh Lord, I've never lived where churches
        grow.
    I love creation better as it stood
That day You finished it so long ago
    And looked upon Your work and called it
         good.
I know that others find You in the light
    That's sifted down through tinted window
        panes,
And yet I seem to feel You near tonight
    In this dim, quiet starlight on the plains.

I thank You, Lord, that I am placed so well,
    That You have made my freedom so com-
        plete;
That I'm no slave of whistle, clock or bell,
    Nor weak-eyed prisoner of wall and street.
Just let me live my life as I've begun
    And give me work that's open to the sky;
Make me a pardner of the wind and sun,
    And I won't ask a life that's soft or high.

Let me be easy on the man that's down;
    Let me be square and generous with all.
I'm careless sometimes, Lord, when I'm in
        town,
    But never let 'em say I'm mean or small!
Make me as big and open as the plains,
    As honest as the hawse between my knees,
Clean as the wind that blows behind the rains,
    Free as the hawk that circles down the
        breeze!

Forgive me, Lord, if sometimes I forget.
    You know about the reasons that are hid.
You understand the things that gall and fret;
    You know me better than my mother did.
Just keep an eye on all that's done and said
    And right me, sometimes, when I turn
        aside,
And guide me on the long, dim, trail ahead
    That stretches upward toward the Great Divide.

 

I have a confession to make.  I am a happily married woman (see last Monday's post) but if Kevin Costner were to walk in a room my knees would start to tremble, big time.  And because I'm a South Dakota girl every time I watch the movie Dances with Wolves my heart bursts with pride for the beautiful depiction of the Native Americans, the amazing scenery, the lush soundtrack and yes, the handsome Lt. Dunbar. 

Since I visited a few of my favorite South Dakota places in my blog this weekend, I thought I'd move to the Black Hills this morning and drop in on my favorite actor and this great scene from the buffalo hunt.  I remember vividly the night my family was camping in Custer State Park and we heard a buffalo roaming the campground near our tent...you can't forget the snorting, kind of whuffling sound bison make, especially when they are just feet away from you, with only a thin tent between the two of you!  Carl Sandburg's poem is certainly true about the magnificent bison herds, but if you visit the western part of South Dakota you can still see this beautiful animal roaming the plains.  It's quite a sight.

Buffalo Dusk

 Carl Sandburg

The buffaloes are gone.

And those who saw the buffaloes are gone.

Those who saw the buffaloes by thousands and how they pawed the prairie sod into dust with their hoofs, their great heads down pawing on in a great pageant of dusk,

Those who saw the buffaloes are gone.

And the buffaloes are gone.

 

Have a great start to your week!  And later this week, we'll talk about Colin Firth, but shh...don't tell my husband!

Trail of the Spirits

Entrance to Sica Hollow, State Park

It's that time of year again...if we were still living in South Dakota we would be making our annual family pilgrimage to Sica Hollow, located in the northeastern part of the state near the Sisseton-Wahpeton Sioux Reservation.  Every year my parents would round up all the siblings and our families and caravan to this spirit-filled state park for an October family reunion.  We'd bring a picnic of fried chicken and hike the trails, ending with a beautiful fall drive to a nearby apple orchard where Mother and Dad would buy all of us bushels of apples.  I always had pie dough waiting in the refrigerator at home so we could have a fresh apple pie that evening!  

We would hike along the Trail of the Spirits, so named because of the eerie legends of the place.  The Native Americans named the hollow 'sica' (evil) because of the horrific stories that were passed down about its dark and damp ravines.  Even today, natural occurrences like glowing swamp gasses and tree stumps fuel the mysterious atmosphere.  The Dakota Sioux told a creation and vengeance story about this area, and claimed mythical figures fought here, which explained the red-tinged water.  The fears of the supernatural quickly spread to the early white settlers as well, and the area has never been settled, becoming a state park instead.  For those that have been brave enough to stay overnight in the park, many have reported hearing voices and chanting, the sounds of cries and war whoops and a few have even reported sighting ghostly braves.

What better place for a spooky, fun-filled pre-Halloween adventure?  I must admit though, we never felt anything supernatural--for our family it was just another wonderful place where we could admire the beautiful South Dakota outdoors and celebrate coming together with our extended families.  It was memory-building time, and to this day there is always a Sunday this time of year where I think how much I'd love to be with everyone again, eating chicken and hiking the trails of Sica Hollow.

Trail of the Spirits, Sica Hollow I hope you enjoy this lovely Native American prayer, translated by Chief Yellow Lark of the Sioux tribe in 1887:

Oh, Great Spirit, whose voice I hear in the winds
Whose breath gives life to the world, hear me
I come to you as one of your many children
I am small and weak
I need your strength and wisdom

May I walk in beauty
Make my eyes ever behold the red and purple sunset.
Make my hands respect the things you have made
And my ears sharp to your voice.
Make me wise so that I may know the things you have taught your children.

The lessons you have written in every leaf and rock
Make me strong--------!
Not to be superior to my brothers, but to fight my greatest enemy....myself

Make me ever ready to come to you with straight eyes,
So that when life fades as the fading sunset,
May my spirit come to you without shame.

At the entrance to the Trail of the Spirits, @ 15 years ago.  We won't talk about the matching wind suits, okay?!

I couldn't let the opportunity to post this picture pass me by...I absolutely love this photo of my mom and dad in the early seventies, getting ready to head off for a day of hunting.  What's so very funny about this picture is that my mom was NOT a hunter.  We are very much alike--books are our passion, not hunting!  But my mom and dad shared adventure after adventure together for fifty years, so here they are, ready to take on the day.  Here's a funny little poem about the bird who 'got away'....I hope my parents had better luck!

The Last Cock-Pheasant

R. C. Lehmann

Splendour, whom lately on your glowing flight
  Athwart the chill and cheerless winter-skies
I marked and welcomed with a futile right,
  And then a futile left, and strained my eyes
To see you so magnificently large,
Sinking to rest beyond the fir-wood’s marge—

Not mine, not mine the fault: despise me not
  In that I missed you; for the sun was down,
And the dim light was all against the shot;
  And I had booked a bet of half-a-crown.
My deadly fire is apt to be upset
By many causes—always by a bet.

Or had I overdone it with the sloes,
  Snared by their home-picked brand of ardent gin
Designed to warm a shivering sportsman’s toes
  And light a fire his reckless head within?
Or did my silly loader put me off
With aimless chatter in regard to golf?

You too, I think, displayed a lack of nerve;
  You did not quite-now did you?-play the game;
For when you saw me you were seen to swerve,
  Doubtless in order to disturb my aim.
No, no, you must not ask me to forgive
A swerve because you basely planned to live.

At any rate I missed you, and you went,
  The last day’s absolutely final bird,
Scathless, and left me very ill content;
  And someone (was it I?) pronounced a word,
A word which rather forcible than nice is,
A little word which does not rhyme with Isis.

Farewell! I may behold you once again
  When next November’s gales have stripped the leaf.
Then, while your upward flight you grandly strain,
  May I be there to add you to my sheaf;
And may they praise your tallness, saying “This
Was such a bird as men are proud to miss!”

From The Vagabond and Other Poems from Punch | John Lane Company, 1918

I hope you have some adventures of your own today!

I have mentioned several times in my blog that I was born in Indiana, and what wonderful memories and close ties I have with my relatives there.  But when I was five I moved to South Dakota and became a girl of the prairie--wide open spaces and a horizon that goes on forever.  Fields of flax, golden sunsets, snow mounds so high we pretended they were the Alps and climbed them on our way to school, and .... pheasants.  Driving in the country we would spot the famous Tinker Town concrete pheasant...a symbol of the rugged outdoor/hunting lifestyle of my adopted state.  And since my dad was a rugged outdoor/hunting type of guy, October meant one thing to him...pheasant hunting.  As the poem title below implies, there is more to pheasant hunting than just throwing your gun in the car and heading to the country.  Oh no, you must FLUSH out the pheasants from the fields!  This involves taking all your children, lining them up in the corn rows and telling them to start walking until you heard a heart-stopping whrrrr and a bird, wings flapping wildly, would fly up from his hiding spot right in front of you.  Then, of course, you were supposed to drop flat on bristly cornhusks while the hunters took aim.  This was not my favorite weekend occupation.  But now, looking back, I'd give anything to be tramping the cornfields with my dad again.  

Pheasants, by James A. Meger

Flushing Pheasant

Robert Barboza

They will of course have heard you coming
long before you ever see
or hear them,
even though you imagine yourself
being as sure-footed and quiet
as a fox in springtime

You may step ever so lightly
down the well-worn deer trails
silently push away the clinging branches,
always be careful to stay
cloaked by the sound
of rushing water

But they will of course have heard you coming
long before the male bolts out from the brush,
exploding up and away in an instant,
into the trees to distract you
with beating wings
and angry cries

And if you patiently back-track
from the launching place, carefully follow
his muddy steps in the damp ground,
with luck you might discover
where the hen sits hidden
on speckled eggs

Lying half-buried beneath her,
cradled in the softest nest of grass,
breathing slowly through their thin shells,
feeling safe and warm and invisible,
and they will of course have heard you coming
for a long time now

Tinker Town Pheasant, built in 1950



Good morning!  Last week we visited Elizabeth Barrett Browning, so I thought it only fair to take time to say  hello to the man who swept her off her feet and out of her father's household.  While he is best known for his dramatic monologues, this poem caught my eye because I loved the imagery of the earth smiling and basking in the warmth of the autumn sun.  I hope you have time today to 'bask in the sun' and enjoy these treasured fall days, all the more sweet because of their transcience. 

Among the Rocks

Oh, good gigantic smile o’ the brown old earth,

      This autumn morning! How he sets his bones

To bask i’ the sun, and thrusts out knees and feet

For the ripple to run over in its mirth;

      Listening the while, where on the heap of stones

The white breast of the sea-lark twitters sweet.

That is the doctrine, simple, ancient, true;

      Such is life’s trial, as old earth smiles and knows.

If you loved only what were worth your love,

Love were clear gain, and wholly well for you:

      Make the low nature better by your throes!

Give earth yourself, go up for gain above!

They’s something kindo’ harty-like about the atmusfere...

Anyone else out there a 'sweater weather' girl?  I admit it--I love autumn and all the food and celebrations that go with the season.  Chunky sweaters, homemade breads, a big pot of soup, fireplaces crackling, warm socks on chilly nights, flannel pajamas and best of all....pumpkin pie.  I love pumpkin pie.  It's my favorite dessert, and I used to ask for pumpkin pie instead of a birthday cake!  Fortunately, my mother is the world's best pie maker, so pies graced our table frequently.  I made two pies this past Sunday, and guess what I had for breakfast this morning?  Hazelnut coffee and pumpkin pie....hello, autumn! 

I've been waiting for the perfect fall day to post one of my favorite poems by Indiana poet James Whitcomb Riley.  I first learned this poem in Mrs. Gilman's third grade reading class and I've loved it ever since.  Poetry serves so many purposes--it can calm us, it can inspire us, motivate us, and touch our souls, but sometimes poetry exists just to make us smile and rejoice in another day.  I hope you enjoy the poem, and your day!

When the Frost is on the Punkin

James Whitcomb Riley

When the frost is on the punkin and the fodder’s in the shock,

And you hear the kyouck and gobble of the struttin’ turkey-cock,

And the clackin’ of the guineys, and the cluckin’ of the hens,

And the rooster’s hallylooyer as he tiptoes on the fence;

O, it’s then’s the times a feller is a-feelin’ at his best,

With the risin’ sun to greet him from a night of peaceful rest,

As he leaves the house, bareheaded, and goes out to feed the stock,

When the frost is on the punkin and the fodder’s in the shock.

They’s something kindo’ harty-like about the atmusfere

When the heat of summer’s over and the coolin’ fall is here—

Of course we miss the flowers, and the blossums on the trees,

And the mumble of the hummin’-birds and buzzin’ of the bees;

But the air’s so appetizin’; and the landscape through the haze

Of a crisp and sunny morning of the airly autumn days

Is a pictur’ that no painter has the colorin’ to mock—

When the frost is on the punkin and the fodder’s in the shock.

The husky, rusty russel of the tossels of the corn,

And the raspin’ of the tangled leaves, as golden as the morn;

The stubble in the furries—kindo’ lonesome-like, but still

A-preachin’ sermuns to us of the barns they growed to fill;

The strawstack in the medder, and the reaper in the shed;

The hosses in theyr stalls below—the clover over-head!—

O, it sets my hart a-clickin’ like the tickin’ of a clock,

When the frost is on the punkin and the fodder’s in the shock!

Then your apples all is gethered, and the ones a feller keeps

Is poured around the celler-floor in red and yeller heaps;

And your cider-makin’ ’s over, and your wimmern-folks is through

With their mince and apple-butter, and theyr souse and saussage, too! ...

I don’t know how to tell it—but ef sich a thing could be

As the Angels wantin’ boardin’, and they’d call around on me—

I’d want to ’commodate ’em—all the whole-indurin’ flock—

When the frost is on the punkin and the fodder’s in the shock!