Clouds cling low,
I tend the fire:
stir red coals—dry
branch of manzanita
alongside oak,
crack of air
to the woodstove—
play solitaire
and wait for words
that hide behind
naked sycamores
along the creek
too deep to cross,
the flood of news
too much
for pleasant poetry.
Posted in Photographs, Poems 2017, Ranch Journal
Tagged Dry Creek, news, photography, poetry
That public men publish falsehoods
Is nothing new. That America must accept
Like the historical republics corruption and empire
Has been known for years.
Be angry at the sun for setting
If these things anger you. Watch the wheel slope and turn,
They are all bound on the wheel, these people, those warriors,
This republic, Europe, Asia.
Observe them gesticulating,
Observe them going down. The gang serves lies, the passionate
Man plays his part; the cold passion for truth
Hunts in no pack.
You are not Catullus, you know,
To lampoon these crude sketches of Caesar. You are far
From Dante’s feet, but even farther from his dirty
Political hatreds.
Let the boys want pleasure, and men
Struggle for power, and women perhaps for fame,
And the servile to serve a Leader and the dupes to be duped.
Yours is not theirs.
A lie told once remains a lie, but a lie told
a thousand times becomes the truth.
– Joseph Goebbels, Minister of Propaganda, Nazi Germany
Remove yourself.
Go outside alone.
Find a flowerbed,
some earth to turn
with your hands.
See history fall
between your fingers:
old leaves and roots,
bugs and worms—
this is truth.
Out here,
we watch money
come and go,
but a man’s word
is all he is,
his handshake bond—
once broken
not depended on,
of little use.
Twice broken
he is scorned,
ostracized and ignored.
Life must be too easy
to entertain deceit
on stage, to play
make-believe
with humanity.
Out here, we know
the ending—
but not what happens
in-between.
for Leonard Durso
I regret to report the creek
is still too high to cross,
running muddy with white caps
where summer cobbles baked
beneath bleached moss
housing aquatic bugs—little
towns anticipating rain—
a month’s work on the other side:
clearing roads of trees, fences
under limbs, slick black calves
waiting to be stretched for an iron
and I’m inside polishing poetry
instead of oiling my saddle
I’m almost too old to ride.
No one behind your desk
to report to for twenty years,
no one to argue how to spend
time and money improving
how to get the work done
when the creek subsides.
I’ve yet to learn
where the tree frogs go,
four years drought
between symphonies.
I regret to report I’m tired
of the world beyond our fences
where there is no truth,
no beauty left in the storm
of news I’m addicted to
waiting for my daily fix,
each outrageous episode
is drama enough
to keep from thinking,
to keep from working
to keep from wanting
anything more than
where the tree frogs go.
Posted in Photographs, Poems 2017, Ranch Journal
Tagged photography, poetry, rain, tree frogs
Their song has survived hard ground,
the dry and dusty years, the dead and dying
trees without moisture, brittle broken roots—
sopranos, altos and baritones, a gleeful
impromptu chorus praising a month of rain,
they have survived sixty-six million years,
the asteroid’s collision, climate change
to serenade outside my window—symphonies
all this time before we walked this earth.
Like an old girlfriend,
she has moved in—first
to rise and last to bed, she stays
up to keep us from working
with more rain at once
than the earth can drink
and we say nothing, too
superstitious and polite
to complain within earshot—
with four year’s dust still
clogging veins and arteries,
we grin like idiots
stranded on an island,
water all around. In 1867,
the chickens starved in trees
and they gave boat rides,
water taxis up and down
Main Street for weeks
bringing food and freight
in from Stockton. She’s
been a good houseguest.
High cold wet fog after rain
puts a lid on summer’s cauldron
earth wet to rock, each crease
leaks rivulets into the canyon
to join a muddy creek.
Curiosity burns in his belly,
lone winter coyote edging closer
by different approaches
mid-day or night—
dogs hold him at bay
until he leaves the edge
of our territory.
Young downstream cowboys try
clay flat, pickup, gooseneck
just inside the gate, diggings
piled behind the drive wheels
as I pass by.
Twenty years ago
I’d have stopped to help
got stuck
and they learn nothing.
Two hours back from town
with a burn permit,
they’re hooking up
on muddy asphalt.
High cold wet fog after rain
creek too high to cross
I clear my desk, bag years
of paper files for proof
of our busyness
for the burn pile:
dry summer prunings
up in smoke
lost in fog.
Posted in Photographs, Poems 2017, Ranch Journal
Tagged Dry Creek, photography, poetry, weather, winter
The ’56 International
was almost indestructible
when the straight-six fired
and the six-volt starter
got beyond slow groans
to ignite a spark,
explode the vapor
in the piston chamber
to run on her own.
She was temperamental
with smooth hood up,
heavy round fenders
and running boards—
a tough country woman
easy to personify
wanting procedures
in order
you had to remember
or become superstitious
with only juice enough
for two chances
to start over.
I never locked her up
when I left,
but always a toss-up
which way to go:
take the longer asphalt mile
and hope for a ride
or wade the creek
straight cross-country
in my wet boots home.
for Tim Loverin & Richard Barkley
No other love song, only
the comforting sound of fury
rumbling, rolling, churning
upstream like an old lover
returning to hold and stay
awhile with sycamores,
waist-deep, remembering
the boy with single-shot .410
reaching from the far bank
for dove in the top limbs
before the floods of ’67 & ’69
enveloped them, before
our high-water kisses in ’97
shared tears with rain—pure
ecstasy after so long dry.
Posted in Photographs, Poems 2017
Tagged Drought, Dry Creek, photography, poetry, rain, weather
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