Journey
Who is Blogger/Poet/Fiction Writer/Artist Ann Johnson-Murphree?
HAPPY HOLIDAYS TO EVERYONE
2014
HOLIDAY SNOW – ACRYLICS
BY
Ann Johnson-Murphree
Ann Johnson-Murphree
Author Bio…
Born in northern Alabama, father was a Native American (Chickasaw) sharecropper who managed a farm for a businessperson from Decatur, and a mother who worked in the local cotton mill during the Depression to pay for Beautician School. Although her mother lived in the same house, she was emotionally absent since the Author’s birth. The author, raised by her father, Native American great-grandmother and an African-American woman all were great storytellers.
Instead of playing like most children, she roamed the countryside alone or with her father and at night she sat at the feet of these strong-minded individuals listening to the stories of their lives. During the summer, she lived with her fathers’ sister in Birmingham, Alabama; it was there that she would discover a library, and mingle with her aunt’s circle of friends that included local writers, artist, and politicians. A cabin deep within the Black Warrior Forest was the weekend retreat and filled with these people from a different life than her own. This aunt encouraged the imagination of a young Ann with the gift of her first journal, which she filled with stories over the summer. Planted was the desire to write, a seedling waiting to spurt from the warm southern heart of a child.
Nonetheless, with adulthood, the desire to create buried itself deep within, the dream wilted but did not die. It lay dormant, gaining experience all written in hidden journals. These experiences, the contents of these journals became short stories and poetry reading to share with the world.
Throughout the years along with her father, great-great-grandmother, and her beloved Aunt Francis, other influences were, Faulkner, Capote, Fitzgerald, and Harper Lee. Later in life, I discovered the warm and comic writing of Grace Paley. The Collected Stories, the vivid poetry of William Carlos Williams; the strong poetry of Phyllis McGinley, and the world’s most exciting women, Maya Angelou are some of the poets at the top of her list.
The harshness that shrouded her life would cause her to withdraw from most of the world; it fills the pages of her writing, the heartache, the abuse, and the denial from her mother. Today, at a stage of life where she enjoys her children, grand and great grandchildren, her four-legged companion Mason, she lives in Southern Wisconsin…far from her southern roots, writes and paints daily.
ONE OF THE MANY REVIEWS ON HER WORK:
Southern living, tragedy, memories, and nostalgia… 2014
By Dr. Karen Moriarty – Karen Moriarty, Author of “Defending A King ~ His Life & Legacy” [about the incomparable Michael Jackson]
“As a former teacher of English and creative writing, I approached the reading of Ann Johnson-Murphree’s “Honeysuckle Memories” with real enthusiasm. Poetry is not a wildly popular genre currently. However, I have always enjoyed it, partly because it can be consumed in bits and pieces and at any time of day or night. This book did not disappoint. I consider poems the poet’s personal journey of heart-soul-and-mind. This collection of poems is about Southern living, tragedy, death, and memories. The poet-author’s background as a child who grew up in northern Alabama, a sharecropper’s daughter who farmed for his living, colors much of her work. I enjoyed the flow of her writing, her style of combining prose and poetry, and her reflecting the imagery from her earlier memories in vivid terms.
I recommend that you buy and read this book. It is priced well — to entice the potential reader to venture into the realm of poetry. Ms. Johnson-Murphree enjoys, above all else, sharing her love of writing with others who will enjoy it, understand her better, and share her personal journey.”
THE POETRY OF ANN JOHNSON-MURPHREE AT AMAZON.COM –
A Sachet of Poetry…
Sachet of Poetry the “final” poetry book to be written by this author on a lifetime of experience growing up in “poor” southern conditions, living with depression and through the loss of two children. The other coffee table books in the collection are Echoing Images from the Soul, Reflection of Poetry, Honeysuckle Memories and Beyond the Voices. There is also a book of artwork, personal therapy created during the year following the loss of her children. These poems a tiny fragments of mind, heart and soul. The author is currently working on an accounting of her young life growing up in Alabama.
A Sachet of Poetry: Adoration Aspirations Anger Asylums
Authored by Ann Johnson-Murphree
Coffee Table Book
List Price: $5.24
8.5″ x 11″ (21.59 x 27.94 cm)
Black & White on White paper
54 pages
Black & White on White paper
54 pages
A collection of poetry created from tiny fabrics of life. These poems characterize the thoughts of innocence sold into a false world of adoration. Living in silence, God did not keep this innocence from hell, and death would be a long way off and life was between the now and then. Ahead lay sacrifice, pain and suffering. Life should be fruitful; the human life produces scenes of public, private distress and anger springs forth with hate and blood. Mortally led to the mysterious world of knowing the fist is not love, it is the slaughter of innocence…
Purchase this book at:
Season to Live…
Season to Live…
Making yourself live without
contact with others, you are
doomed. Like the flowers of
summer without human
contact, the soul may cease to
bloom.
Time and stillness may be an
important need; to reject sharing
life with others, may be the
greatest form of greed. Purpose
has its seasons, life follows a
well-planned path; your journey
has a reason.
Clearing the mind and restoring
the spirit will smooth any rutted
road; listen, there is a plan of how
your life should unfold. You may be
on the right path today; the journey
may seem rough, the essence and
energy of your spirit will find the true
way.
Gratefulness, awareness and God’s
grace is woven within the fabric of
your being for a reason. Devote today
to discovering your true self create…
your own season.
©2010.annjohnsonmurphree
Jagged Words of Hate…
Words of hate destroy the
souls of those who speak them,
Listen…
Do they really help bring final
separation, severance from life,
from truth, has but One reality,
one certainty…
Isolation…
On the dreamscapes of time,
chosen paths encounter many
illusions; look intently into the
pitch-black pool of life.
Try to see beyond that which is
touchable, is disillusion the fear.
Jagged words of hate are born
in the beastly nightmares of life.
They are broken remnants of our
inter-selves and the mind will deny
the images of what it will see or hear.
Those words of hate have reached
their destination and have destroyed
the soul intended now in isolation,
so let this be hates final separation.
Registered©2012annjohnsonmurphree
All books at Amazon.com
The Storm Pit… (An excerpt from a story in progress)
The Storm Pit…
Daddy dug a big hole in the side of the hill that edged the land near our tiny clapboard house. With shovel and pick in those big calloused hands he worked all day at the crimson clay dirt, I played while he labored making me a safe place to hide from the evil of the tornado’s that claimed domination over our valley. I ask why he was working so hard, I wanted to go fishing. “The Spring House is not safe”! He kept digging. The day over, the promised fishing trip complete and months passed when daddy looked at the sky and told me to get a jar of water and come with him to the storm pit. I entered the dark hole in the hill, daddy lit a lamp. Roots ripe as old bait dangled from the ceiling covered by old mildewed crates. Their wicked necks looked like snakes. It stank, leaf mold and slippery planks. Even the dirt kept breathing small claustrophobic breaths. I never entered the “pit” again, I would take my chances with a tornado!
2014©annjohnsonmurphree
Before the Voices…
Before the Voices…
You left the world to early, free from a life that
left you filled with doubt. You lived the lives of
many, the voices, always hoping just to be
I now wait for that spark from heaven, I willed
you not to go, God did not agree. Was your life
fulfilled in such a short time, will I ever know.
You had beginnings, disappointments, new starts;
you worried about tomorrow, unable to feel happiness
in what you accomplished today.
I suffer your being gone, sadness wretches my days, the
glow died there was no hope. It seems like one long unhappy
dream.
Roaming within my mind, I walk the fields of your life. A
time of clouded joy, then time was blown away. Born in
innocence, fresh, life clear, before the voices took over,
bringing fear. I could not help you in your solitude while
you nursed your unconquerable fears.
As the moonlight pales, I yearn for lost years, before the
mental strife. Before the voices took over your life. It was
after sunset that you died, a void that cannot be filled, you
will never grow old. I miss your smiles, your red tresses
flowing down your back, your light will always shine; your
radiance will never fade.
Sleep my child in eternal rest…
2014©annjohnsonmurphree
Slipping Away…
Moonlight, alone in silence ascending my
Stairs once more, below the stars waves
Crash upon a white sandy shore. On the
Hillside my garden too is silent I look out
Over the sea, alone, a star shooting across
The sky, an invisible hand, a fireball thrown.
I wait in the dark, between space and space,
I lift my hands to my face. Who am I, my
Name is unknown to me, I look into the
Mirror yet my eyes cannot see.
The flesh is pallor and pale, the wrinkles…
Each with a story to tell. Hair, white, long
Tied up in a bun…I would leave this place
Nevertheless, I have nowhere to run.
A mournful melody spins in my brain, a tune
That I cannot recall…roses to smell and
Mouths to kiss, in a locked room I hide
From it all. Never will I feel rain drops on my
Cheeks, it is the shadow of death that I try
To cheat.
The heavens are dark and deep, I will forget
These things before I slip into a silent sleep.
From this room I can hear the ocean roar, rain
Falls and dead gutters come alive once more.
Yes, I will forget all of these things before I slip
Into a silent sleep.
©2013 ®annjohnsonmurphree
Unfulfilled… (A touch of micropoetry)
It is the alchemy by which we evolved, the
Self, the role of others, the absolute that
Was to come, this will provide generations
With the story and still as humans we find no
Need for celebration. A self-seeking breed, all
Interconnected to each other would not be
Satisfied with only getting out of life what they
©2013 ® annjohnsonmurphree
Wild Mountain Rose…
There is a legend upon Mossy Ridge children hear while listening to the old folks weaves their tales around their supper table at night
About…
Two gentle spirits walking the rutty mountain roads under the mystical Tennessee moonlight. These stories begin many years ago about an old Cherokee and a little girl he called his Wild Mountain Rose –
Folks …
First saw her drinking from a cool mountain stream all legs and dirty yellow hair, abandoned by her family, so the story goes, but no one is sure of that, if the truth were told. The first time the old Cherokee saw her she was sleeping under a bush folks call the Wild Mountain Rose –
Afterwards…
She was with him no matter where he would go. Folks would say that without old Willie Youngblood she would not have survived –
Willie…
Knew that without her, he himself would have died. The years went by quickly and they both grew old, time had touched their hair with gray –
And…
They could only dream about their younger days. One cool spring morning, Willie woke to find her gone from his side; he sat for hours head hung low as he cried –
Later…
He found her lying peacefully; she had died under a familiar bush on a soft bed of leaves, a mournful death chant was the only way the old Cherokee knew how to grieve.
Now if you know where to look, it is in the Tennessee Mountains where Willie Youngblood’s Wild Mountain Rose can be found –
Beneath…
The damp rotting forest floor in a shallow grave, up on Mossy Ridge near the entrance of Chicopee Cave. The following winter Old Willie died, and they buried him next to his Wild Mountain Rose –
Folks…
Say in the moonlight two ghostly spirits can be seen sitting on the banks of Chestnut Creek, or floating along the rutty mountain roads.
When the sun comes up, they disappear…
Or so the legend goes, but everyone on Mossy Ridge knows that it is Old Willie and that golden haired pup he found many years ago that he called his…
Wild Mountain Rose.
ann johnson-murphree 