The Fallen Flower: A Contemplation of Grace

By F.J. Comer

Written and collected over a lifetime, the poems contained within The Fallen Flower center on the ups and downs of life and how Grace plays an essential role in helping us through both trials and triumphs. It offers different understandings of our humanity, as viewed through the lens of various characters in a multitude of situations.

• Language: English
• Publisher: BookBaby
• Release date: May 26, 2018
• ISBN: 9781543934724

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American Z

The fading light dips low behind the horizon’s lone, dark wall, as quiet evening shadows gather and grow. Fading rays dapple the heavens in puddles and pools across the vast, endless sky...

Buried deep within the rolling mazes of wheat fields and gravel roads; a worn and shabby structure sits alone in the fading light of America’s western tapestry. Set apart, and for the most part forgotten now, it is home to an old, but comfortable, country store; a living relic, a stoic testament of days gone by.

Wedged snugly at the corner of a lonesome crossroads, it stands back against the marshy bar-pits, which run alongside the old rail-line. Stagnant and dank, the pits are home only, to rushes, bullfrogs and cottonmouths.

Years of exposure to the ravages of searing heat and wicked chill, have worn down upon the place without mercy. And, having weathered one too many dusty, western winds, and survived the perpetual torrents of wild prairie thunderstorms, the building sits...much in need of repair.

A slight breeze stirs the loose dust into gentle swirls, lacking the necessary oomph to produce the enigmatic dust devils, so common to these parts. The sweet fragrance of freshly cut cereal grasses, mingles with the ever-present aroma of dusty loam, tingling the olfactory senses; stirring up old and familiar memories, both pleasurable and sorrowful.

On the porch, hanging aslant, and swaying gently in the warm evening breeze, an old and weathered tin sign bids all comers, a warm and humble, Welcome. Hanging aside the wooden, spring-loaded screen door, a faded logo advertises Lucky Strikes, while neon signs flicker unsteadily in the greasy window, announcing that, not only Coors, but Coca-Cola as well, are both, equally Cool and Refreshing, and readily available inside. Flies alight and buzz about, as the door creaks open slowly, and slams shut quickly, for the few who now drift in, and out.

Within the store, a couple of wooden-floored aisles run the length. The sparsely stocked, dusty shelves carry an odd collection of merchandise. Everything from Twinkies to hand tools, nite-crawlers to motor oil, and cheap perfume, to chew, is available.

The old couple who run the place seem ancient as well. Both are old and gaunt, framed in wiry, grey hair and shabby, but clean work attire. The woman says little, as though she carries some sorrow, that none can know or share. But the old man has a twinkle in his eye, and speaks in a friendly way, to the few who now pass this way.

Across the loose gravel parking lot, out past the gas pumps near the edge of the scrub, stands an old electric pole. It leans precariously over the lot, looking down forlornly upon a long-broken, pay phone. Perched loosely on the store-side of the pole, an old streetlight, looking much like a faded, silver goose neck, hangs its lamp wearily.

A worn, sodium bulb throws out a muted stream of light, cutting a neat swath through the muggy evening heat. An odd, steady buzz emanates from the transformer above the light, humming in rhythmic accompaniment with the swarming menagerie of mosquitoes, and the call and response of the cicadas and tree frogs, in a late-summer, twilight orchestral serenade.

Within the sharp confines of the sulfur-yellow circle of light, a young man leans lazily against his old Dodge pickup. He looks up slightly and slowly exhales a whiff of bluish-white smoke. It lingers momentarily beneath the low brim of the dusty Stetson, which sits, pulled so low, as to leave nothing but a hint, that a pair of keen, young eyes are watching the world pass by. He shuffles dirt around with the toe of his boot, before sending a small rocking skidding across the lot, with a sharp kick.

An unfinished bottle of Lone Star balances on the truck sidewall, warming slowly in the radiant heat, while he looks about, earnestly pondering the state of affairs in his little slice of Heaven. The truck sits parked at the gravel’s edge; driver’s door ajar, from which, a slow shuffle of country music drifts softly into the dusky gloom.

The sun hangs low upon the horizon now, pausing momentarily, before expanding into a massive orange disc, as it greedily ingests the last remaining rays of western light. It is a spectacle to behold like no other; a celestial light-show.

A pastel array of hues, weave in and over, and through one another, as puffy and wispy clouds straggle along in loose packs, or streak by in thin, drawn-out trails. While, lurking in the background, heavier, thicker clouds bank-up into formidable dark fortresses, building and tumbling...before trailing off into a tumbled mass of muted blues and near-translucent violets, only to finally tag out, as an undefined blob of ivory-tinted grayness. All of this, highlighted by boulevards of industrial-strength orange, blending and fading through reddish-yellow sheets; stabbing through the bluish-gray panorama, before evaporating into the ever-advancing, dark, gray wall.

Slowly it moves; a meteorological behemoth, consuming or deflecting light rays of shooting photons, which have traveled so very far...only to be sent packing by random specks of floating terrestrial dust.

Gray and blue swatches meander and morph with the magnificence of a soft lavender afterglow, punctuated by cottony cloud-pillows, stretching fast across the vast firmament. A stunning canvas of color, light and shade, playing out upon the ethereal dome of the heavens, for all of God’s creation to behold.

The day’s quickly fading heat shimmers like a mirage, across the bleak landscape. Soon it will dissipate completely, leaving a cool night chill, upon the crisp, thin air.

The cowboy shifts his stance, and flicks his spent cigarette in an arc