David Thomasson
11-16-2008, 05:28 PM
Not exactly nature photography, but this is the sort of "old bird" it would have been a privilege to know. His grandson posted his picture on a retouching site a week or so after the old gentleman died, and I retouched it. He had been a farmer his entire life, the sort of self-sufficient individual we don't have nearly enough of anymore. His grandson said his grandfather was the kindest man you could ever hope to meet.
The experienced etched in that grizzled old face reminded me of a little piece of verse I had written years earlier. "Henry Trumbull" was inspired by an old fellow who carried newspapers in my hometown when I was growing up. He trudged the downtown streets and sold his papers one at a time to anyone who would buy them. He carried a whole bundle on his hip and walked bent to one side to compensate for the weight. He had carried papers that way for some many years, he was permanently bent. The name "Henry Trumbull" and all the rest are fictional; the qualities seem to be expressed in this old gentleman's face.
http://img412.imageshack.us/img412/6706/grandpa1es4.jpg
Henry Trumbull
There lived a man in my hometown whose face was spare and dull;
His eyes were small and too close to his nose.
His ears were large and stood out quite a distance from his skull;
His body didn't quite fill out his clothes.
Despite old Henry's odd-built frame, he had the kindest eyes;
His voice was never heard to gripe or gloat.
We'd hail him from a distance, for we'd always recognize
Henry Trumbull's tattered overcoat.
Henry spied a boy one day, fishing off a dock,
He'd cast for hours but nothing took his line;
So in his pocket Henry found a hairspring from a clock,
And tied it to a hook with colored twine.
The makeshift lure had barely sunk when something fiercely struck;
A bass was running with the boy's float.
Old Henry could work wonders with the artifacts and truck
Stashed away in that old overcoat.
A broken, painted floozy came to our town for a spell;
She dressed in scarlet laced with indigo.
A barroom fight broke out one night, but not a soul would tell
Who swung that chair and dealt the fatal blow.
But one man showed compassion for the tramp who dressed in red;
A rasping thank you rattled from her throat.
And with he last pathetic breath, she laid her battered head
On Henry Trumbull's rolled up overcoat.
They think a locomotive spark fell on the mayor's home,
And set the blaze that brought folks on the run.
Rafters popped and windows burst, the gutters boiled with foam;
The heat burned like a summer's midday sun.
Precious, endless minutes passed with three still trapped inside:
The mayor, and his baby, and his wife.
The townfolk watched in agony; some wrung their hands and cried;
But none could help, 'twould cost a man his life.
Two or three men rushed the house but turned back with a scream;
To enter there would bring a blazing death.
And then the crowd saw something that the very saints esteem,
A thing that froze their blood and stopped their breath.
A smoking lump rolled out the door, sopping wet with water,
And from it came a muffled keening note.
Tossed right out of h ell she was, the mayor's infant daughter,
Wrapped in Henry Trumbull's overcoat.
Thirty years have passed, the little girl's grown up and wed;
She has a home and children in the yard.
A simple wooden frame hangs on the wall above her bed;
It holds a scrap of cloth all stained and charred.
And every night before she sleeps, she takes especial pains
To bow her head and quietly devote
A moment to his memory, and touch the last remains
Of Henry Trumbull's tattered overcoat.
The experienced etched in that grizzled old face reminded me of a little piece of verse I had written years earlier. "Henry Trumbull" was inspired by an old fellow who carried newspapers in my hometown when I was growing up. He trudged the downtown streets and sold his papers one at a time to anyone who would buy them. He carried a whole bundle on his hip and walked bent to one side to compensate for the weight. He had carried papers that way for some many years, he was permanently bent. The name "Henry Trumbull" and all the rest are fictional; the qualities seem to be expressed in this old gentleman's face.
http://img412.imageshack.us/img412/6706/grandpa1es4.jpg
Henry Trumbull
There lived a man in my hometown whose face was spare and dull;
His eyes were small and too close to his nose.
His ears were large and stood out quite a distance from his skull;
His body didn't quite fill out his clothes.
Despite old Henry's odd-built frame, he had the kindest eyes;
His voice was never heard to gripe or gloat.
We'd hail him from a distance, for we'd always recognize
Henry Trumbull's tattered overcoat.
Henry spied a boy one day, fishing off a dock,
He'd cast for hours but nothing took his line;
So in his pocket Henry found a hairspring from a clock,
And tied it to a hook with colored twine.
The makeshift lure had barely sunk when something fiercely struck;
A bass was running with the boy's float.
Old Henry could work wonders with the artifacts and truck
Stashed away in that old overcoat.
A broken, painted floozy came to our town for a spell;
She dressed in scarlet laced with indigo.
A barroom fight broke out one night, but not a soul would tell
Who swung that chair and dealt the fatal blow.
But one man showed compassion for the tramp who dressed in red;
A rasping thank you rattled from her throat.
And with he last pathetic breath, she laid her battered head
On Henry Trumbull's rolled up overcoat.
They think a locomotive spark fell on the mayor's home,
And set the blaze that brought folks on the run.
Rafters popped and windows burst, the gutters boiled with foam;
The heat burned like a summer's midday sun.
Precious, endless minutes passed with three still trapped inside:
The mayor, and his baby, and his wife.
The townfolk watched in agony; some wrung their hands and cried;
But none could help, 'twould cost a man his life.
Two or three men rushed the house but turned back with a scream;
To enter there would bring a blazing death.
And then the crowd saw something that the very saints esteem,
A thing that froze their blood and stopped their breath.
A smoking lump rolled out the door, sopping wet with water,
And from it came a muffled keening note.
Tossed right out of h ell she was, the mayor's infant daughter,
Wrapped in Henry Trumbull's overcoat.
Thirty years have passed, the little girl's grown up and wed;
She has a home and children in the yard.
A simple wooden frame hangs on the wall above her bed;
It holds a scrap of cloth all stained and charred.
And every night before she sleeps, she takes especial pains
To bow her head and quietly devote
A moment to his memory, and touch the last remains
Of Henry Trumbull's tattered overcoat.