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The Federal and the Doric
The Federal and the Doric
Combined a stern austere;
They frowned upon the quad;
They spread a healthy fear.
Corinthian and Victorian
Looked at the ground downcast;
No one liked their whimsies;
Their fancies would not last.
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Mars
Mars, the stars a redness adds,
Far from war, he’s bled the lads,
Still his kill, the distance naught,
For them, who him, his glance has caught.
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Old Home Place, Final Day
We took the home place down today,
A little thought, a little pray;
For what, back in the day, was wrought,
Homemade or grown, then what we bought,
And in the shadows, at the last,
Presently, I saw the past:
My folks as me, who made me thus
Sadness, laughter, work and fuss.
We took the home place down today,
But what they built still walked away,
Not shuttered, roofed or even floored;
I’m just a building for the Lord.
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Turning, Burning, Churning
In a dream, I turned from sin,
Resolving not to fail again,
And in my dream I saw the myth
In all its real and churning pith.
Above the dream there spun a wheel
And burned an engine wrought of steel;
Though right, it wrenched from wrong and ill,
And sight and stench were awful, still.
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Alec Ream is a writer living in Virginia. His poetic work and creative fiction have been widely published. A member of the Demosthenian Literary Society at UGA, he wrote on Lookout Mountain, and continued to write, lecture and work for Delta Kappa Epsilon HQ. He was first published reading to the pledge class of Michigan DKE, in Ann Arbor in 2008. Recently, his poem Green Fire was read at the Washington Literary Society & Debating Union at UVA.
One of these poems reminds me of an old bluegrass song, which contains the line: “I’m workin’ on a building, for my Lord, for my Lord.”
D.P.,
I know that song. I’m a big fan of Bluegrass music, especially Bluegrass Gospel. I’m pretty sure that Bill Monroe covered that song at least once.
The song is called Working On a Building, recorded by Monroe in 1954, but the original version was by the Carter Family who recorded it in 1934. I first heard it from a group called
Old & In the Way.
I like “Turning, Burning, Churning” the most.
“Turning, Burning, Churning” appeals to me because it links a dream, which is intangible, to the solidity of steel. This makes for a satisfying contrast.
Thank you