Damn-near naked now
after good rains
without a frost
by New Years,
fleeting autumn colors
gone drab brown
before undressing.
Each twig stripped
of new growth leaves,
water pumped
into veins to see
if these fine lines
survive—and we
along for the ride.
Posted in Photographs, Poems 2026, poetry, Ranch Journal
A young man’s pastoral dream
of forever meadows sprinkled with cattle
was still possible with work and rain,
with the right people and partner
to hold it, and one another, together
humbly yielding to the dry years,
the brown leaves of families:
old oaks dotting the hillsides
before saying goodbye—
before me now in a light rain upon
the green as I step gladly into it
to check the rain gauge.
Gray rain at dawn,
colorless silhouettes of sycamores
filigreed, having lost half their leaves
to the Christmas gift of storms
after a month of fog—we pray
the world beyond will pause
for a breath, follow suit,
find a common sense of peace
like black dots of cattle
grazing ridgetops, chasing green
reaching for the heaven sent
miracle of rain.
No sun forecast to ignite the leaves,
but a raft of clouds before the storm
Christmas Eve, an atmospheric river
to fill the creeks and streams.
In 1955, Mill Creek’s rising measured
on the hour, on the concrete
steps into the house full of kids
and stacks of unopened presents.
Cut’s Studebaker pickup towed
our ’53 Buick out of a hole,
waves of the Kaweah swamped
its headlights on the way home.
It’s swirling now around the planet
bumping the coasts of continents
with the miracle of rain
sustaining earth and flesh
by the design of details
yet to be noticed and digitized
when Dad would watch neighbor’s windmill
for confirmation, three days out
of the southwest, or by his journaled cycles
see seventy percent success. Instead of signs,
we await the forecast and cuss
the weatherman when wrong.
for Marge Stiles (1919-2005)
I am amused with the new vocabulary of weathermen like “hydroclimate whiplash” during the atmospheric rivers a couple of years ago. I just read a new one, we’re on day 21 of our “tule stratus” as we head to Paregien’s to gather for Wednesday’s branding where hopefully we’ll be above the fog.
In the canyon
fog descending at dusk,
a gray blanket tucks us in
along the creek’s flaming sycamores
and silent trickle.
Wrapped in a cold cocoon,
insulated from the dreadful dramas
of an outside world,
we rest easily in the dark
with a taste of peace.
Cold and damp, we wake to add split oak
to coals banked in the woodstove
and wait for dawn’s dim light to see
how thick the fog that has consumed us
for weeks—and the cows and calves
we must gather before we brand,
before the rains leave dirt tracks
too slick to travel up the mountain—
bull calves to sell instead of steers for less.
An ocean of fog with islands of green,
a world below where commerce
and consumption carry-on conveniently,
where pundits and politicians spar
for the last word, and the weathermen
guess what Nature has left to teach us.
Posted in Photographs, Poems 2025, poetry, Ranch Journal
Tagged branding, cattle, fog, nature, rain, weather, weathermen
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