Most years, there is no need,
nor time, for vacations. Over
the weekend, a lioness visited
the canyon, screamed all-day
for her tom. Last month, an
extinct wolverine was spotted
along the creek, and occasionally
a Condor sails somewhere north
of where he’s supposed to be.
Sapsuckers and Towhees
range off their maps, and when
the snows swing south, this
could be Bavaria, before ten
generations spread across
this untamed continent
from the Shenandoah
looking for adventure
and more ground to farm.
Staying here, the rules are few:
your word and what you do
are all that count for currency—
the balance trades as counterfeit
rhetoric among the natives
where there’s always someone
with a sack-full of polished beads
looking to be a chief. An ebb and
flow unchanged away from home.
drycrikjournal 