Category Archives: Photographs

GRASS

Posted on November 5, 2016 by John | 3 comments

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”

3 Comments

Posted in Photographs, Poems 2016, Ranch Journal

Tagged birds, cattle, grass, photography, poetry, rain, water, weather, weekly-photo-challenge, wildlife, Yokuts

Ranch Journal: November 1, 2016

Posted on November 4, 2016 by John | 1 comment

A dark day after over an inch of rain, Terri and Lee feed the replacement heifers before the Wagyu bulls arrive next month. Already dated, this photograph doesn’t show the green that has spread across the damp ground in the past three days. Temperatures forecast for the next ten days are in the mid-to-high-70s—perfect growing weather for our native grasses. Already, our first-calf heifers are leaving our flatter feeding grounds for the hillsides in search of green grass tall enough to bite, steep ground softer now to climb and graze a little dry feed with the new.

Shorter days stuck in the low-50s, chilly mornings linger as both man and beast seem slower to get started, much of the pressure off after four days of rain and a thick germination of seed. Robbin and I are already talking firewood after we check the cows and calves on the Paregien Ranch, a Kubota load to augment the leftovers of last year’s stack, kept short to discourage rattlesnakes around the house. We’re ready, I think, to face whatever weather we get this winter, hoping always for well-timed rains.

1 Comment

Posted in Photographs, Ranch Journal

Tagged cattle, grass, photography, rain, weather

PROPAGATING GREEN

Posted on November 2, 2016 by John | 1 comment

The seed beneath the dry, dead grasses
waits, as we have waited to begin again
with rain, to plant themselves, screw and twist

into damp dirt, to swell and burst—first
hands open to feed the living, applaud life,
millions of ovations standing on their own.

Each a miracle rising from hollow, blond
and brittle stems, from the dust of bare
red clay and sandy ground—alive and green.

Our private holiday, hope and relief let go
to breathe freely, to work fully within
this new beginning for one more poem.

1 Comment

Posted in Photographs, Poems 2016, Ranch Journal

Tagged grass, photography, poetry, rain

Welcome Rain

Posted on October 31, 2016 by John | 2 comments

A delightful four days of rain, the ground accumulating nearly an inch and a half of warm moisture here on Dry Creek, enough to start the grass and get our season under way. We fill our lungs, exhale and sigh, satisfied. Despite the dry winter forecast from multiple sources, we trust the excess old feed will help hold the moisture on the hillsides between rains, adding cover for the new grass to grow within.

2 Comments

Posted in Photographs, Ranch Journal

Tagged Dry Creek, photography, rain, weather

TREE FROG TALK

Posted on October 28, 2016 by John | 6 comments

I heard a rumor
that this world is much bigger
than we imagined.

6 Comments

Posted in Haiku 2016, Photographs

Tagged haiku, photography, wildlife

CONTENT WITH CHANCE

Posted on October 27, 2016 by John | 1 comment

Desk light inside, tree frogs hang on the screen door
stroked by the gentle damp breathing of a downcanyon
breeze, deep dark mouth clear to the mountain pines.

No stars, all black, we wait—anticipate cloudy daylight
together, a red sky dawn and rain, slow at first
approaching, its tiny footsteps soft upon dry leaves.

No new amazement, this cleansing of dust, this erasing
memories and tracks that leaves the ground fresh,
that may swell the seed to burst into green cotyledons,

open-handed to receive sky blessings, small miracles-
in-waiting—a chance, we dream. Wishing is not praying
yet among the bone-dry years, broken skeletons

of old oak trees flailing across hillsides in herds
just before Halloween, Buckeyes drip with bloody
leaves while goblins claim what we cannot see.

1 Comment

Posted in Photographs, Poems 2016, Ranch Journal

Tagged Drought, photography, poetry, rain, weather

THE DREAM

Posted on October 25, 2016 by John | 7 comments

October 27, 2014

A slice of time incised from ranch
routines, an Indian poet-in-residence
for a week, Jack Kerouac on the wind

escaping Montana’s sub-zero to write
about dreams. He thinks in Crow,
undulating hands stroke the grace

between them, never touching speak,
pleasant sounds of rushing water gush
from his lips I almost understand.

I envy this bear of a man
who brings brightly painted ponies
and the Little Big Horn with him,

the feathered glory of reenactments
and contact with the old chiefs
that breathe past and present here

upon my skin. What a way to go out
to become one with time, turn the soul
loose and gather ‘round the fire

of mountain men, all the old cowboys
and pioneers, all the natives done with
trying to make a living on this ground.

for Henry Real Bird

7 Comments

Posted in Photographs, Poems 2016, Ranch Journal

Tagged DREAMS, Drought, photography, poetry

TRADING LABOR

Posted on October 23, 2016 by John | 5 comments

February 12, 2015

A black and white macro of weathered wood,
corrals and hills beyond, old guitar song
and chiseled men follow smoke to the ridgeline

and back to the fire and branding iron. A ringing
cell phone colors riders, a black calf stretched
between two sorrels—blue denim action

of men and women, old neighbors dancing,
each genuflecting to a moment on the ground.
“We’re branding calves,” a limp loop

answers from the corner, looking down
canyon past hazy orchards, somewhere town
as if he could see the caller, the papered desk,

stretch the thirty miles. A guy with a drone
reports, “We got ’em all.” Empty white tables
and chair legs licked by green tongues wait

with meat, bread and beans on an oak fire, ice chest
beer below a towel, soap and water, plastic glasses
and fresh jug of whiskey ready on a tailgate.

Close again, the chatter of visiting face to face,
gossip, stories and mysteries unveiled, fading
with cows with calves strung up the canyon home.

5 Comments

Posted in Photographs, Poems 2016, Ranch Journal

Tagged branding, Calves, cows, Greasy Creek, photography, poetry

CONTEMPLATION

Posted on October 22, 2016 by John | 1 comment

There is no urgency,
no destination worthy
ignorance along the way—

even on the familiar
road, nothing stays
as it was—and probing

eyes never quite the same.
All the assumptions,
short-cuts to conclusions

we claimed as instinct
that never were:
laziness and wishful

thinking, yet
we blaze away,
unload both barrels

trying to eliminate
our smoky confusion.
We will get there

soon enough. Make
each moment rich
as a Chinese poet.

                    I venture no more than a low whisper,
                    afraid I’ll startle the people of heaven.
                         – Li Po (“Inscribed on a Wall at Summit-Top Temple”)

Weekly Photo Challenge: ‘Shine’