Within a week of late October rains, a forest
of green blades twisting, chasing warm
golden light between canyon horizons,
reaching while we sleep to a waxing moon
sailing south across black starlit seas—
a germination thick as hair on a dog’s back.
Hard clay turned soft underfoot, under cloven
hooves, out of the bleached and brittle rubble
of last year’s feed, a spreading miracle of green
as the earth stirs with another birth of grass.
And we are tied to it, mentally shackled
and physically restrained to work within her
moody generosity, daring not with word
or thought to piss her off—we have our gods
and goddesses we adore, stealing glimpses
every chance we get outside to pause
and praise them. All our totems, the bird
and animal people of the Yokuts know
our names, know our habits, show us the way
this canyon was designed to support life,
here and beyond us, with a crop of grass.
Weekly Photo Challenge: “Chaos”
Nicely done John. It does seem to be a miracle that all that brown turns to green.
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After the seemingly endless years of drought and a typical hot and dusty summer, green can be shocking. To see new life sprout amid the dead is indeed a miracle, the genius of nature that inspires hope.
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How very nice, and you taught me something too. Who knew grass greened in October in parts of my very own country? Thank you both for the lovely words and the education.
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