Before the surplus oilfield pipe
replaced the split redwood posts
and creosoted oak railroad ties,
we remember the old board pens,
acorns tucked twixt crack and plank,
fiery lichen on the backside
of weather-worn 2 x 8s:
distant brandings—
deceased men—
voices imitated—
old saws saved
that we exchange,
each triggering the next
underhanded head loop loosed
to hang for an instant,
we snare memories
like calves to brand—lifetimes
stretched from hand to hand.
Leaving the feed grounds
for the ridge tops
with their first calves,
native cows know
where the green comes first
after a little rain
softens the clay
for cloven hooves
and the climb up.
These are not dumb
welfare cows
that we have raised
and fed for months—
but smart survivors
to make us proud.
The old timers built traps
with limp ropes
in small branding pens
before the team ropers showed
to take their place,
as time overtook them
and their steady horses.
Almost anyone can catch
two feet going slow and easy.
Homer, Earl, Dave and E.J.,
I can picture them now
roping just like me.
How could we know
the plans of goddesses and gods
with so much going on, busy
saving and taking lives,
sorting souls
amid this Covid,
while tilting the West
out of range
of the good storms—
bare acres everywhere you go.
If even a shower
could bring some green,
cattle market’s gone to hell.
With everybody begging
for change, the pipeline may be
plugged with prayer overload,
or perhaps our deities
are just teaching a lesson.
Even a rattlesnake
knows when to retreat—
half-a-dozen quick
hide-a-ways
at his mental fingertips.
Who wants to know
the latest detail
of the same old news,
only to recognize ourselves
in Chekhov’s mirror?
Soap opera or box,
all the bad actors
stage left and right
look like possums
in the headlights.
Weary-washed with waves
of news, a man could drown
and sink to the bottom—
but even a rattlesnake
knows how to swim.
Some come quickly now,
a phrase to trigger more
coiled upon the ground
while others hibernate for days,
for weeks and months,
as if they might be dead
without the touch of rain—
that hard and brittle
mindset to survive
like deep-rooted filaree
with all its colors,
with all its seed
waiting for a kiss.
I know no other way
to pen prosody.
Small promise in the dawn’s empty clouds,
more spiritual than stormy or wet,
forecast moisture shrinks the closer we get
to one more year of praying through a drought—
another season of small marvels and miracles
where epiphanies and wonders rise
from this thirsty earth before our eyes
to ease each day’s concerns for survival.
We are so blessed with these wild diversions
from ample grass and fat cattle
that we begin to think that dry is normal
and greet the New Year with resolution.
