Category Archives: Photographs

Enveloped by Fog — January 5, 2010

Posted on May 17, 2015 by | 12 comments

 

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No day to gather
cattle in a sea of fog—
just wait by the fire.

 

 

WPC(2) — “enveloped”

 

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ONE MOMENT, PLEASE!

Posted on May 17, 2015 by | 26 comments

 
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In these hills, a man finds space that feels
familiar and friendly, and it must ask
in ways where we hang empty words
like ribbon just to find our way back – but
we stay a moment and let our horses blow.

They feel it – perhaps they feel it first
and do the asking of the place, or perhaps
it is the shards of light diffused at dawn
upon the many-legged oaks standing
knee-deep in grasses on the near ridge

that shield us from man’s square creations,
his cubic thinking. Perhaps the sensual grace
of limb or slope, or granite worn to look
inside our minds, but there are places
that ask nothing else of us but to breathe

and taste the air, inhale with our eyes
and drink with our flesh for just a moment.
Once dared, it becomes ever-easier to be
enveloped with the wild, an addictive peace
that embraces awe as eagerly as a child

might love – where a man can ride beyond
his time and station, beyond the tracks of those
before him: spaces that beg a moment’s notice
where both grand and simple revelations
are left and learned and lived in place.

                                        “Poems from Dry Creek” (Starhaven 2008)

 

 

WPC(1) — “enveloped”

 

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MARIPOSA LILY Calochortus argillosus x 2

Posted on May 15, 2015 by | 2 comments

 

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Wet years in the clay
lilies unfurling, drawing
heaven’s attention.

 

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THE GIRLS

Posted on May 13, 2015 by | 5 comments

 

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It’s all about the girls
on this ranch, mothers
and grand, grandmothers
grazing a life away.

We’ve found our pace
despite the drought
trusting one another’s
competence and will.

Gentle strumming
in the background,
dark to light
and black again,

no day the same,
each moment full
of contrasting details,
lyrics raining down.

 

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Shipping Wagyu X

Posted on May 12, 2015 by | 13 comments

 

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Yesterday morning, we shipped our Wagyu X calves from our first-calf heifers to Snake River Farms in American Falls, Idaho where they will be fed
until offered as American Kobe Beef. We began our program with Snake River Farms several years ago looking for smaller calves for our first-calf heifers while trying to avoid the genetic hangover of low birth weight Angus bulls. We rent the Wagyu bulls from Snake River Farms and contract to sell all our calves to them for a ten cent/lb. premium over market price.

Born small, our Wagyu X calves ship about 100/lbs. lighter than our English calves. This year, the steer calves averaged 568 lbs., our heaviest Wagyu X steer calves to date. In the photo above, Robbin, Clarence and the girls are parting cows from calves to be weighed before loading them on the truck.

 

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SANITARY ENGINEERS

Posted on May 10, 2015 by | 7 comments

 

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Gathering deacons
waiting between casualties
dream of misfortune.

 

 

WPC(2)–“Forces of Nature”

 

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SUBJECTS

Posted on May 9, 2015 by | 6 comments

 

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We are, and always have been, subjects
of the weather, of the blazing sun
and phasing moon, the swirling winds
and tides—subjects, lackeys to the Queen’s
whims and oversights—all men’s progress
subject to a careless sleeve. We think
we know her moods, read the signs,
taste change, but wait for instruction.

We are among the insects of the grasses,
our labors short-lived and forgotten
on this planet, with our real selves
but a mumble in the background.
We must learn to sing, find a voice
to harmonize with every changing
circumstance—a steady rhythm
we can dance to without stumbling.

No one of us can save the world
its pain, far greater than we care
to imagine, but before us each
new day, a place to put our hearts
and hands to work—opportunities
to improve the space in which we live—
a contagious caring running beneath
the outrageous currents we can’t control.

 

 

WPC(1)–“Forces of Nature”

 

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GRAVITY

Posted on May 8, 2015 by | 15 comments

 

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                             I am growing downward,
                             smaller, one among the grasses.
                                  – Wendell Berry (“Thirty More Years”)

I knew when I was young
and proud, I had found my place
on this ground—my limbs

could support me for as long
as they were sound—living
where the work was hard.

I was not afraid of time
and grinned at gravity,
rode the edges of ridges down

behind cattle, shaping me
to fit the landscape
eventually or die.

I scratch among the grasses now,
learn the language of birds
and flowers, the expression

of horses and families of cattle—
all the tattered glories of youth
bent closer to what counts.

 

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SOMEONE’S MOTHER

Posted on May 8, 2015 by | 2 comments

 

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Pot with bullet holes
blooming but one day in May
for someone’s mother.

 

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On The Run

Posted on May 7, 2015 by | 6 comments

 

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Begging your indulgence for yet another photograph of the Roadrunners, an adult and juvenile, hanging around the cactus nest where one fledging remained yesterday afternoon as I came in the driveway.

We started in the dark to gather and preg-check our third-calf cows, make the sort of who stays where and who goes to town, keeping in mind our scarce stockwater resources. We shipped one bunch of calves Tuesday that sold well yesterday—we’ve been busy. Too busy to sit by the nest for photographs, so whatever shows up here is only by chance, nothing scientific about it.

We know the babies fledge and grow rapidly, and are as mobile as the adults when they leave the nest. Having an adult and juvenile together in a photo, it’s obvious the juvenile is smaller with a shorter tail. Notice also the differences in the eye of each. In a previous post, I assumed four babies in the nest, but revisiting the photo after comments, one of the eyes is that of an adult judging by its tail and the eye of this adult—so only three.

Yesterday evening one of our crow pair, who have been harassing and raiding the bird nests in the yard for several weeks, was at the cactus patch where the one fledgling remained. As the crow left with apparently nothing, an adult and juvenile went to the nest as if to rescue and encourage the last one to leave.

If there’s nothing in the nest this morning, I’ll have to count young beaks to see if it survived, an impossible task unless the three start running together.

 

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