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The Artist’s
Almanac
March 2007
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He that lives in hope danceth
without music
- George Herbert
Last week I planted
a cherry tree. Now I dream of pies, warm from the oven, over laced
with strips of sugary crust, topped off with a glass of cold milk.
These precious fruits are not to be found in markets and the labor
of picking, pitting and preparing them for pies only intensifies
the pleasure when we finally cut through their bubbly crust.
Whoever plants a
tree knows it may outlive him, giving pleasure to who knows whom.
We give as we are given to, in the endless stream of life; trees
are our fit companions along its way, marking our passage with
their fragrant bloom and fruits in due season.
It is said the meek
shall inherit the earth. So, indeed, it seems. Among the meekest
were surely those who were traded once like cattle here. Their
legacy survives in Middle Tennessee, not just in their
descendants, but in their marvelous stone walls, stacked dry,
wandering for miles across our land. Many more are gone, though,
victims of vandals or development. Others have found their way
into houses and garden walls.
These builders were
true artists, and their art survives them. On bright winter days
slaves not assigned to build roads were sent to pick up stones and
dress them square enough to fit into walls. This was backbreaking
work, as anyone who has selected, hauled, hammered and chiseled
limestone will testify. They took their time, these artisans,
rejecting rounded, shaley, or crumbly white stones, setting a wide
foundation, inclining the wall in a steep pyramid designed to
resist the elements and the brute strength of cattle.
We who came after
have sold too cheaply our birthright of beauty. During the WWII
maneuvers here, General Patton’s army ground up fences to make
gravel for roads and truck parks. I now repent how, as a young
boy, I pulled down a section to retrieve a rabbit run to den by
dogs. When we built our home we salvaged a slave-built fence from
the back of our farm for the fabric of our house. Yet we saved the
stone, and now our south-facing wall serves as arbor for a
butter-yellow climbing rose.
These men passed
their masonry skills down son to son, uncle to nephew, so that,
until recently, the best, perhaps the only, stonemasons were
black. So jealous were they of their rare skills, many would down
tools when whites approached to watch them work.
The last of these
local master masons was John Frank Swaney. He lived by the chisel
and trowel, and when his eyes went bad he was out of work, or so
he thought. His impaired vision hampered his selection of stone,
and if he dropped his chisel it took a long groping to find it.
But my wife
insisted: only he could match our new porch to the house he had
earlier rocked. They negotiated a deal – if he would do the porch,
she would help him. So I went to the office each day, leaving her
as apprentice to John Frank, selecting just the right size stone
from the wagon, distinguishing dead stones from live, saving shims
and keystones, mixing mortar. It was his last job; when they
completed it he pronounced her the strongest white woman he had
ever known.
1790s Fence Corner
Many of their
masters’ gravestones are lost to history now and their descendants
have moved on to Texas or California. But these gray and mossy
fieldstone fences survive, monuments to the patient skill of their
builders. In remote boundary corners in old woods, these rugged
works of folk art have outlasted their masters’ cabins and
plantation houses.
I must water my new
cherry tree today.
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