When did whittling go out of style?
And did anything take its place?
Wherever I go, the benches are empty
Not a single smiling face.

As a child I remember my grandfather's knife,
and the shavings so delicate and thin.
As I tried to mimic with a rusty little blade
No danger to cedar or skin.

He would while away the hours with stories
of war and the days of his youth.
While the sweet wood piled beneath him
He regaled me with stories and half-truths.

Saturday trips to town
were like visits to a whittler's fair
With row after row of competitors
lined all 'round the public square.

Lies were told and stories were traded
While the shavings fell softly down.
The conversations gauged
by the size of the pile on the ground.

Then, like music in the background,
unnoticed until it is gone,
not a single whittler was left
in front of the Courthouse lawn.

Will it return? Can it come back?
Or is another bit of history gone?
I ponder this question with cedar in hand
as steel meets a sharpening stone.