May I say the world is sad,
despondent in my blue eyes
behind the wire-rimmed glass
reflecting the outside space
and green tree parts before me.
Thin hair short and gray
to match the beard
that hides some of my face
from the sun it’s become
allergic to ever since
absorbing Cylence
to control the flies on cattle,
my careless machismo
worn for thirty years.
We wear some mistakes
on the flesh, the rest reside
deep inside.
Corrals were different then,
fences sagged, gates dragged,
old chiefs gruff and crude—
and if related, so profane
that only eagles watched
from the tops of twin
Valley Oaks four foot thick.
My father brought his talk
as bait from the Bulge,
disconnected from command
for a week—and the high-headed
cows gathered by too many
wannabes out of the brush
and narrow canyons,
reason to increase his volume.
I learned the language early,
shared it with my town friends
on the grammar school playground.
SUMMER 2025
July mornings warm between the granite
and clay baked canyon walls that soon
in August will be too hot to work within
past 9 o’clock’s blazing sun when waterholes
and springs evaporate, leaving only bleached
moss blankets to cover the turtles and frogs.
California’s foothill news much the same
as 10,000 years ago before we came, July’s
truth no one can change—no executive orders
to distort or rescind, nor histories to rewrite.
No children to let die, no officials to blame.
No houses yet to plant in the San Joaquin.
SEPTMEBER 2025
September dew portends
an early fall, damp
upon the solar panels
gleams before dawn—
expectant heifers waddle
to water, more solitary
in their plodding,
bellies big as barrels,
to graze alone.
A Nuthatch at the water
from the garden misters
collected in an empty dish
but makes room for finches,
sparrows and twohees
fidgeting in line
while I drink coffee
and steal a forbidden smoke
one more time.
As we’ve done every year, we’re recording our first calf of the season here to substantiate of our Age and Source verification for the USDA. Tag # 3362 is now a second calf heifer.
I’ve let the blog slip by with little or no posts lately while I’ve been working on a new collection of poetry, “Native Harmonies; ranch poems”. It’s been a stop and go project for the past year that I’ve pared down to about 90 poems now. Sean Sexton offered one of his paintings that he exhibited at 2025 National Poetry Gathering in Elko for the cover. Here’s my mock up:
It’s been a mild summer as the days are now getting shorter and cooler. Big Wind last week had me moving vehicles out from under trees, gale force winds Saturday while Phoenix was also getting blown away. Influenced by monsoon activity, August is our month for thunderstorms, lightning and wildfires. Looking forward to fall, and a chance for rain.
Posted in Photographs, poetry, Ranch Journal
Tagged 1st Calf 2025, photography, poetry, weather
Too bright to sleep
or wrestle with dreams
with a full Sturgeon hole
rising from the ridgeline
into the night sky
like a gigantic galactic leak
upon us, for all the UFOs
and UAPs to pass through,
for all the excuses we need
to behave like lunatics.
I haven’t the technological expertise to offer Amy Hale’s exceptional Substack post for the kind of attention it deserves, but please take the time read it via this link:
Amy Hale photos
Whether poetry or prose, it’s been difficult to post to the blog under the current political atmosphere of chaos and confusion that has become addicting for those of us who are still hoping to ferret out the truth. Though adding to the whole mess with more political poems is difficult to resist, with few facts, they are seldom enlightening. Like so many other people, we’ve not only sought ways to wean ourselves from the “latest”, but celebrate the positive with the many uplifting alternatives that surround us, reminders of the joy and grace that plays out before our eyes if we keep them open.
We shipped our last load of calves in the middle of May, and since selected our replacement heifers that will get their Brucellosis vaccinations on Wednesday. We will start supplementing them and our 1st and 2nd calf heifers soon thereafter as we prepare them to calve in September. Our carrot has been the 50th Anniversary of the Sea Chest Oyster Bar in Cambria (70 degrees). A month long celebration, we were in attendance for a couple of enjoyable nights.
Back home to 100+ degrees:
The distant hawk’s bare branch at dawn
awaits fuzzy-headed movement
to fall like an arrow fledged with patience.
The sun crawls across the flats
without a sound, wild oats bent
like blond hair combed into the light.
Shadows stretch beneath hillside oaks
into the puddled creek where an egret
goes fishing before breakfast.
Posted in Photographs, Poems 2025, poetry, Ranch Journal
Tagged joy and grace, no politics, photography, poetry, Sea Chest Oyster Bar, writing
Talking bombs,
fast-draw uranium enriched
nuclear bullets, missiles aimed
at predetermined targets—
like the enemy’s essentials:
water, electric
and transportation grid
poisoned and petrified—
and who’s got the best,
them or us? Fighter jets
or drones, B-2s
or attack subs,
who can blow the biggest hole
in the planet? Who can drive
the herd of humans
over the cliff of reason first
into the flames
of Armageddon,
barbecued and
swallowed whole.
Dawn near the Solstice, shadows
seem to shrink in the same places
on the hillsides where cattle graze
towards midday shade, oblivious
to the hackneyed news of war
‘to end all wars’ my whole lifetime
promising everlasting peace—
one way or another now
on the cusp of my reward.
Pale ribbon of dawn—
war fears rise
as somewhere east of here
helter-skelter backroom maneuvers
make knights of pawns.
One more war to end all wars
hangs in the heavens—
one more barren planet
to explore
when your work is done.
Perhaps a better day awaits,
a better way to stifle the narcissistic
egos bent on power, born of greed.
But it must trickle to truly flourish
from the bare ground up.
Blessed are the meek
for they shall inherit the earth.
– Matthew 5.5
Posted in Poems 2025, poetry
Tagged Beatitudes, Jonathon Swift, meek, poetry, trickle down, trickle up, war
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