All posts by Ken Hada

Ken Hada is a descendant of Hungarian immigrants, Gypsy poets, barn dance aficionados, art lovers, amateur philosophers, wheat farmers, cowboys, preachers, teachers and common sense craftsmen. He has four current collections of poetry in print: The Way of the Wind (Village Books Press, 2008), Spare Parts and The River White: A Confluence of Brush & Quill (Mongrel Empire Press, 2010 and 2011) and Margaritas and Redfish (Lamar UP, 2013). The River White is a collaborative effort with his brother, Duane Hada’s watercolors tracing their journeys on the White River from its spring source 700 miles to the Mississippi River. The River White and Spare Parts were both finalists for the Oklahoma Book Award for poetry. Spare Parts was awarded the “Wrangler Award” for outstanding poetry from the National Western Heritage Museum and Cowboy Hall of Fame. Poems from this collection were featured four times on Garrison Keillor’s syndicated program, The Writer’s Almanac. His involvement in the poetry scene includes three presentations at the Neustadt Festival sponsored by World Literature Today and various additional festivals and venues of note. Ken is a professor in the Department of English and Languages at East Central University in Ada, Oklahoma where he directs the annual Scissortail Creative Writing Festival. kenhada.org
poetry

CrookedCreek

We could not fully appreciate
the clear water in Sansing Hallow.
We were only boys
but even then we felt something,
we listened to the voices
whispering through the trees.
We obeyed, followed the water

on Saturday mornings in cut-offs,
tee-shirts and cheap shoes.
We slipped through cool water
that soothed briar cuts
casting yellow beetle spins
into the current — down
among the rocks.

Years later we began to realize
the length of the creek, to understand
its value despite those who abused it,
those who took her for granted.
We fought for the creek,
crying with her wounds, marveling
at her resiliance.

There is something pitifully human
the way we fail to honor heaven
so close to home, the way
we look the other way,
afraid to speak out
refusing to change —
unworthy of her shores.

Steam pillowing through the hills
rising from frosty meadows
in November — late Autumn sun
brightens the morning,
seeps through leafless timber
leaving nothing hidden —
nothing at all.

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poetry

Guest Poet, Sandra Soli

From time to time we intend to publish poetry from guests. My first guest is Sandra Soli, from Edmond, Oklahoma, whose 2007 book WHAT TREES KNOW, received the Oklahoma Book Award for poetry. Her two entries follow:

Implications of Hawk

A certainty of rabbits
makes him fly.

He claims the wind
for himself.

None of us are innocent.

 

 

Saturday in the Wichitas

A rock not climbed before
waits for my boot
pendent with implication

secret as water
from the body or ferns
touching skin to skin.

The rock names me:
Look. Daylights they test
the music of stones,
reading these places we save.

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poetry

The Killing Season

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The Killing Season

is upon us now.
The need for blood
stalks
every turning leaf,

Ragweed drooping
in sagging fields
at sunset.
A morning calm

is no match for lust
pounding
in a bloody heart.
It seems natural

this way we try
to master ourselves.
Autumn ritual
prepares

for winter – Sycamores
blush white,
Oaks redden,
streams coil

around sandy stone.
All of us feel
Time slipping.
For us Time

can do little more
than point
to December
that longest day

when thirst
is finally quenched
and full bellies
dream

of spring
budding again,
somehow,
from depths unknown.

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poetry

Ryder’s Pond

The school bus could not get us home
fast enough, fast enough to drop
our books, change clothes, mount
bicycles and pedal away holding
fiberglass rods with Zebco 33 reels,
red stringers and a black metal tackle box.

We pedaled like blind angels flying
down and around the long curve
of Highway 7 until we landed
in our adopted home waters –
Ryder’s Pond – a deep Arkansas
farm pond, a watering hole
for registered Polled Herefords.

On the run, we dropped our bikes,
high-stepped through snaky Fescue
until we reached water’s edge
then strung purple worms on hooks
and cast into the shadows.

Two hours later, (late for supper),
pedaling back up the long curvy hill
green bass dangling on red stringers,
knowing men in white or tan pickups
would honk, children would gawk
from car windows zipping past.

We would nod holding handle bars
tight, grinning – our delirious dog
racing us. Proud as preening ducks,
we pedaled hard. Like young braves
returning from vision quests – we
had proven their worth.

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Gone by Morning

Like stone, an old man
sits head-bowed
beside dwindling flame
in memory pangs.

How many nights
has he sat with only
the obscure company
of a truck radio?

How many nights
has he camped alone
by this river-curve
hearing strange sounds –

heart beats
midst keening water,
body aching
for morning?

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Yellow Cottonwoods

There’s heartache in these lines
cracking through once-hard ground
crumbling to course dust.

Sadness drifts here
beneath these yellow Cottonwoods
where old men sit
in distorted circles – a parlor
for the ornery and rejected –
where a can of beer
accompanies a well-worn story
told with fading bravado
fear swallowed in slow gulps.

These grains of river sand
dry in wind, sifting
through time, piled around toes
of shuffling boots, legs
dangling off a tailgate
or sitting awry in a chair
whose fabric is stretched
past the point of brittle.

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