Words in the woods

Around here the sun sets in an ocean
. . . of trees.

As it went down tonight and I looked at the calendar, I thought of my grandpa, as I do every April 18th.

Well, of course other times, too. But when that stern, old German harnessmaker got mellow of an evening -- with a cigar out in the big tent in the yard, away from grandma, and maybe even with a glass of applejack -- he'd recite Shakespeare, or sometimes "The Village Smithy." Or:

Listen, my children, and you shall hear
Of the midnight ride of Paul Revere.
On the 18th of April in 'Seventy-five --
Hardly a man is now alive
Who remembers that famous day and year. . . .

I'd fall asleep on my cot out there in the tent, listening as grandpa galloped on.