Wisteria: Fresh Flowers from an Old Vine

By J.P. Lucas

A compilation of poems about love Wisdom and love bring peace. The opposite of wisdom and love is what keeps the whole world in turmoil. I hope what I have written here helps someone discover or rediscover their love for their wife, their family and the power of Gods unending love.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Trafford Publishing
• Release date: Apr 22, 2014
• ISBN: 9781490732701

J.P. Lucas

The author has a wide range of life experience: raised in a near nineteenth-century Appalachian mountain environment; an American history student and a revolutionary war descendant; a student of human characteristics and behavior, lifelong businessman, father, mountain horseman, hunter, pilot, machinist, heavy equipment operator, MSHA instructor, mine owner; and an inventor, writer, speaker, and musician.

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© Copyright 2014 J. P. Lucas.

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978-1-4907-3269-5 (sc)

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978-1-4907-3270-1 (e)

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Miss%20Polly.jpg

Miss Polly

J. P. Lucas

Born and raised in the mountains of Appalachia, in a near nineteenth century environment. Went to Frankfort Pilgrim College in Indiana, a horseman since childhood, a horse breaker, ranch hand, musician, mountain hunter, aviator, businessman, inventor, poet, author, heavy equipment operator, strip mine owner, land developer, builder, contractor, volunteer firefighter, accused occasionally of being an engineer. A father, student of human behavior, student of history, a graduate of Hard Knocks University, magna cum laude. Is an MSHA certified instructor, blaster, mine operation and safety.

J. P. Lucas says, A man can do a lot in a lifetime if he doesn’t sleep too much. He can become a jack of many things and master of them all. He often quotes Longfellow.

"The heights by great men reached and kept

Were not attained by sudden flight,

But they while their companions slept,

Were toiling upward in the night."

Lucas says: A man’s home is not only his castle it is also his filling station. He asks the question:

Did I really spend a lifetime sleeping, with an angel in my bed?

Or have hallucinations begun, to fill my greying head?

Did I really see and feel and smell the roses and watch the wind bend the winter trees?

And was I sent here for some purpose, was there really someone besides myself to please.

He says: I write of a lot of different things, but I love to write of love and kindness. He writes: Wisdom and love bring peace. The opposite of wisdom and love is what keeps the whole world in turmoil. I hope what I have written here helps someone discover or rediscover their love for their wife, their family and the power of God’s unending love."

Dedication

This book is dedicated to my Precious, Precious Polly.

Acknowledgements

The successful completion of this work is due to the endless support of all my children who have lent to me the invaluable moral support, technical expertise, physical and financial support necessary for me to complete it.

Thanks:

Anna

Wesley

Tammy

Lance

Laine

Introduction

I’ve heard it said when one gets old they have a tendency to talk to themselves.

Though that is not one of my worst habits, I do find myself, on occasion saying something to myself.

Then there are times I find me saying something to someone who was there a moment ago who has walked away. Those are the times I have to wonder where was I when they left? My mind must have been somewhere else when I could, or should have been paying at least as much attention to them as they were paying to me. I have finally come to the conclusion that most of us are somewhat absorbed in ourselves and the doings of our own minds.

For the most part we spend a tremendous amount of time tolerating the presence of others. Others are those objects that constitute the periphery of our physical and mental boundaries.

For instance I hear my wife ask me: Would you please take out the trash? I continue what I am involved in, possibly working like a dog on some project or, mental wool gathering, it makes no difference the importance of the task. Then sometime later, seconds, minutes or after a while when I get around to it I answer or forget to answer. The problem is that I am more involved with my project, mentally or physically than hers although hers may be just as important, or more important, than mine.

I believe this kind of inconsiderate behavior seems to get worse as one becomes more familiar with another. Somewhere along the line we get used to the presence of others. They become part of the furniture. Sure we want to please or accommodate them. We love our children, our wives and our husbands, but as we love a bright and sunny day we often take them for granted.

We think to ourselves what a wonderful cheery day. I can get the lawn mowed, the grass watered, the car washed and ride my bike today. We think of a hundred things we can get done. We take the beautiful day for granted.

Do we not often put our loved ones in the same category? We are so used to their wonderful presence and the things they allow us to do that we seem to think of them as the beautiful days we enjoy that allow us to do so many other things.

Because the sun shines I accomplish dozens of things I could not do on a sub-zero degree winter day. Yes, I stop to give thanks to my wonderful God that makes the sunny day available to me to use for my purposes. But I wonder if I have always stopped to give thanks for the woman that tries to break in on my project and ask me to take out the trash? Without her it would be as hard for me to accomplish those things I do as it would be for me to plant flowers in the snow in frozen ground.

Well, over the years I have worked hard on that particular project. I have stopped innumerable times to give thanks to the Lord for my wife, my children and friends. Have they always known how much I value them?

How much I love them?

Would, or will they ever know, how much I would like for them to remember me as someone who would have had a hard or impossible life without them?

These questions have bothered me at times. So, I not only thank my Lord for them, I thank them personally for being so valuable to me in my life. I have found the reward in that not only by their love for me and knowing that to be true but having pride in and loving another satisfies something within a person that is medicinal.

I am physically healthier, for some reason, because I love my wife, my children and their children to come. I am excited with positive anticipation as I look forward to the wonderful children my grandchildren will produce because of the wonderful children they are.

I get up in the morning energized by the radiated energy the young ones exude. Endorphins produced by the stimulation of their zest for life relieve the discomfort of that which I may experience on any given day. Their hopes and dreams excite me deeply in a way that is impossible to explain.

I watch my children as they oftimes struggle with the trials of life and their hard times. I find no joy in those things they must go through. I do rejoice in knowing they are the kind of people that struggles will surrender to. They are not the kind to surrender to struggle.

They are overcomers, not overcome.

I pray for them that the struggles of life make them strong then, with time, even stronger. I do not waste time worrying about them running short of breath during the marathon. I watch them closely anxiously awaiting the moment they exuberantly burst through the ribbon a winner with their arms and hearts raised in salute to the Master, at the finish line.

I have, it seems like forever, told my sons they will have hard times but they are to be the expectation of my life. My good men.

My daughters I love beyond belief. There are three of them that are all successful women in their own right. They have all done amazingly well at their chosen professions. They have a tremendously broad range of knowledge about life and the practical things of life. Many cannot believe the variety of things about which they are knowledgeable.

One of them, Tammy, was employed in a job where she was required to dress extremely well. One Monday morning she went to her very professional job dressed to the nines. One of her co-workers asked her: What did you do over the weekend? She replied: I helped my dad overhaul a diesel engine. She said the person could hardly believe she had answered as she had. That daughter is now an assistant director of nursing for the Veterans Administration.

My wife and I are looking forward to our oldest daughter graduating with her Registered Nursing degree shortly. She will graduate at age forty-nine and just a little over a month later her mother and I will celebrate our fiftieth wedding anniversary. She is starting a new career when most are leaning back in their canoes and letting the current take them downstream to retirement. I hope in my family we leave a lasting heritage; we don’t quit. Would it be possible for her mother and me to be more proud of this lady who is now reaching the goal of her lifetime? By the way, her hobby is riding horse-back in the Rocky Mountains.

Her youngest sister works for an insurance benefit management service and is a leader in her company who has worked by my side helping me edit and publish this book. They have all had their struggles. Now they are flexing the muscles of success and knowledge developed in their lives. They have children of whom we expect much, who will accomplish much. So when you read the content of this little book of poems and rhyming short stories you will read much of what I have written that pertains to my family.

The star of this presentation is the woman that has graced the throne of my heart for half a century. She is an energetic star that has danced to the music of this extravaganza from the opening curtain. I cannot give adequate credit to the flawless performance of this diminutive colossus of my life. She has always been stunningly beautiful lady, the perfect description of dynamite in a small package.

As a young man I am sure I did not realize what or who I was privileged to marry. Somewhere in the progression of my life I began to see the real person under the microscope of time. I watched as the diamond was polished by the hand of the Master into the dazzling brilliance that has reflected His light onto the pathway of my life.

In the great courtroom of life you may charge me with excessive love for my family and you need not spend a lot of time and treasure searching for evidence of same. I stand admittedly guilty as charged.

All that I have written anywhere is inspired by this particular group of people. To the good men and women of my family of all the generations to come I dedicate all written here and all to come.

In ending I say that it is my hope and my prayer that something written herein will inspire, encourage and energize someone, somewhere, to love someone, lend a hand to someone, lift someone, show someone the way to Christ, remind someone of freedom and help someone make good choices.

Jp     3/21/2014     TYL

*TYL… Thank You Lord

Contents

Miss Polly

Introduction to the author

Dedication

Acknowledgements

Introduction

Foreword

Angels Never Sleep, Or Do They?

A Smile

Christmas and the Fourth of July

Love Never Sleeps

My Lady To Love

If I Had Been Working

The Gem In Diamonds Hand

That Man Tyrell

God knowing

Where We Love and Live

P Stands For Polly

If In The Sowing There’s A Reaping

Little Hands And Tiny Feet

Knights Come In Different Shapes And Sizes

I Really Love Them All

Where I Lost My Heart

How Can Two Be One?

filling station

A Night To Remember

Street Lamps

The Conversation

Did You Ever Think?

Did I Really?

She Did What?

From The Woods At The Bottom Of The Hill

What Is So Much More Than Beautiful?

Time travels at different speeds

Friends Are Funny Fellers

Jake and The General

With God’s Help

Water Under The Bridge

Eight Opinions

Everythings OK

I Saw Two Lovers Walking

Your Children

On Judgment Day

Part of the aging process

Papaws Dream

Of Historical Interest

I Don’t Know What To Say About Polly

If You Can’t Practice

We Create Our Own

I’m Not Blind

Jimmy Neal

Lord Help Me Be…

If Men Would Only Learn To Listen

Wisdom

Never Try?

The Castle

EGO

Any kid

Showers of Blessings

What’s Your Favorite Verse?

I Remember When

Wisdom and love

For Forever Will

two miracles

I’ve seen it happen

When I Was Important

Out Of Love

It is not years

If You Had Everything I Wished

As A Young Man

Caleb’s Birthday Poem

God Blessed Me?

He did it my way

Her Halo

Justice

Holding Hearts

I’d Be Willin’ To Bet

Illustration by Wesley Joseph Prouse

Is It Just Some?

Kodak Black and White

Love has its rewards

My Precious Little Rose

Nineteen Forty-six

After You Know It All

Who?

Where Sweet Apples Used To Grow

Who Was He Supposed To Blame?

A Real Man’s Daughter

Choosing

Everybody Has A Head

Flashes of Lucidity

a very small restaurant

Who Moves The Unseen Wind

Little Flower

I Listened To My Heart Beat

I’ll Not Be A Stranger?

just not quite right

A Story About A Dog

When a house is empty

Little Creatures On The Sand

A clean kitchen

Things I’ve Not

Stupidity, what I like about it

Stand Up, Stand Out

My Neighbor

Tears Ran Down My Heart

Illustration by Kathi Laine Prouse

The Fable Behind The Legend

Reputation

The Forest or The Trees

What is What and Which is Which

The Stained Glass Window

Pity

The Very Best We Can

Til All Eternity Is Through

any old dog

Uncle Sam

What Does Respect Look Like?

The Greatest Pleasures In Life

What Did I Miss?

We Don’t

You Can’t Get There From Here

The Shabby Bampoo

To Be Freed From Love

Two Famous Truckers

A House Full Of Angels

She Was Always There

I Must Brush My Tooth

Some Pray

The Broken Cup

She Always Makes Things Good

Mango And The Angel In The Black Dress

Sleeping With An Angel

Gaydreck

He Or She Should Go Home

Enough’s enough

Tam

Old Paths

Laziness

My Dad

Foreword

Please find enclosed:

Information and questions about Angels, Love and Smiles. Learn about Providential Romance, Sowing and Reaping, and the ever-present love of a mother and a faithful dad.

As you read, it is my hope that your way be lightened by Street Lamps, that you appreciate more the Funny Fellers that are your friends, and be thrilled to think you are the reason that makes someone else’s day.

With each page you turn, it is my hope that you will appreciate the value of your children more, learn that Knight’s are sometimes disguised in unlovely appearance, and wisdom is oftentimes found in a cracked leather cover.

I really hope that every season will be a season of blessing, and that you learn to Really Love Them All, and that the warm and welcome rains of spring cement your love for that special person in your life and you learn how Two Can Be One and live forever in your Dream Castle.

I hope you encounter few pesky mosquitoes in your life, and find someone in your world that is So Much More Than Beautiful.

It would be my wish that you dream big and realize all of the potential within you as you discover what you can become With God’s Help.

I would want you to gain an encyclopedic knowledge of every good thing, and the wisdom needed to Practice what your vast knowledge gives you the ability to Preach.

May you always