drycrikjournal

January Deer

Posted on January 15, 2011 by John | Leave a comment

Because our count and fences are always suspect, Bob and I went back to the Top yesterday in the Kubota to make sure we got everything gathered Thursday, planning to brand on Monday. All we found were deer.

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Posted in Photographs

BASIC FORECAST

Posted on January 14, 2011 by John | Leave a comment

We know how it goes
after a storm, sometimes
wet fog clings for days,

weighs on the mind
when we can’t see out –
can’t feel the sun move

within us. The first light
white will blind us,
before the colors come

reaching for blue, blue
sky and cumulus sailing
into shapes we recognize.

And so it goes from dark
tempests and torrents,
before the lupine leafs

from bare sticks, before
its purple plumes wave
into the buzzing, warm

pulse that will fade
again with the sun – yet
no season, the same.

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Posted in Photographs, Poems 2011

Tagged lupine

PHYSICS

Posted on January 13, 2011 by John | Leave a comment

So much depends
on soil –

tire, wheel and
rain,

the position
of stars

and that distance
of time

between gravity
and grace.

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Posted in Poems 2011

AMONG US

Posted on January 12, 2011 by John | Leave a comment

Almost invisible, these gods
are not immortal, not
the all-powerful deities

displayed for symbols
and slogans – some haven’t even
a name to trade your mind

and heart for, like in heaven,
where pouting angels
look down with envy

upon their pagan games.
These gods slip upon you
around a flame, surround

like darkness, touch your
shoulder, or cover the flesh
in a dry rain of oak leaves –

they breathe the memories
of all that’s gone before –
living secretly among us.

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Posted in Poems 2011

Greasy Loop

Posted on January 11, 2011 by John | 2 comments

Kaweah Watershed - January 10, 2011

The gray fog and low clouds clinging to these saturated foothills finally gave way to a little sunshine yesterday. This shot of the snowpack in the Kaweahs was taken from a ridge below Sulphur Peak. I attempted the loop in Greasy to check the cows and calves and to make certain that our bulls were still home working, and to assess the condition of our roads. It’s WET, water running, dribbling, oozing everywhere. With an accumulation since December 15th, our rain gauge overflowed, holding 12 inches when completely full – a lot of rain for this country in a little over two weeks.

Creek in the Road

I ran into the creek at the bottom of Sulphur, a part of the flow diverted into the road up the draw by limbs, leaves and debris that I was able to remove with a shovel and chainsaw. Remarkable runoff when one considers that the last significant rain occurred a week ago.

All the stock ponds are full and running out their spillways. I couldn’t complete my loop because the pond at Grapevine was going over the dam/road, and I had to backtrack through Sulphur to get off the mountain. Despite the cold on the Kubota, it was exhilarating to see some sun and cattle.

Slick - calves unbranded

(click photos to enlarge)

2 Comments

Posted in Photographs

Tagged Greasy Creek, Great Western Divide, Kaweah, rainfall, Sulphur Peak

THREADS

Posted on January 10, 2011 by John | 1 comment

                        Nothing you do can stop time’s unfolding.
                        You don’t ever let go of the thread.
                                      – William Stafford, (“The Way It Is”)

Out on Highway 99, silhouettes of semi-trucks
appear in the fog, grow into tiny lights ahead
or leer, big-eyed from behind in a blind rush –

up and down the Valley – like trains submerged,
caravans tunneling this thick and gray resistance
to time’s unfolding as the road grows longer.

The Real Birds came visiting in their Cadillac
and laughed at how I measured miles to Fresno
by the clock, grinning from a grounded dimension.

Our thread is not a straight line connecting cities,
but meanders more like a creek with gravity –
with the flow or against the current to its source.

1 Comment

Posted in Poems 2011

Tagged fog, Highway 99, Real Bird, The Way It Is, thread, William Stafford

Lemon Cove in the Rain

Posted on January 9, 2011 by John | Leave a comment

April 3, 2006

These 2006 photographs caught my eye while looking for some color here, for something other than poetry, and even these gray shots of Lemon Cove lift my spirits. The fog, clinging to these saturated hills since the New Year, drizzles today, weighs heavy on the eyes and mind. We haven’t seen our cattle for a month, haven’t got a calf branded, ground too wet to get a pickup to them.

Clarence drove his Kawasaki Mule to the Paregien Ranch in the fog yesterday, choosing the cold and wet over pacing the house, to find the rain gauge full, roads sloughed and so wet, we’ll probably have to ride from Dry Creek to gather and brand them after a week or so of sunshine and no rain.

I haven’t been across the creek since our Corb Lund replay of ‘The Truck Got Stuck’ New Year’s morning with the birders, my son and the neighbors, since another inch and three-quarters rain. The work is stacking-up as we begin to think about Elko, wondering how we’re going to get it all done.

Lemon Cove Women's Club - April 3, 2006

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Posted in Photographs

Tagged Corb Lund, Lemon Cove, Lemon Cove Women's Club, My Truck Got Stuck, rain, weather

LETTER TO LINDA HASSELSTROM

Posted on January 9, 2011 by John | 2 comments

Dear Linda, I think of you driving nights
between snow banks, long distances
between farm house lights and little
towns flickering ahead – I think of resolve
to turn a word to fit the truth, hard facts
that wear the heart smooth and bodies out.
I think of you peering under the corral boards,
the love and fear of it, graphic words
jumping off your tongue on their own.
We could make a movie together, gray
reflections in the middle of nowhere,
turning the barnyard upside down
for another look at the world, another
look at why we’re here, at why a life
without some small purpose beyond ourselves –
a waste of time and flesh – better fertilizer
on the prairie to be blown to another place.
Meet you in Elko to read some poetry –
separated by soothing melodies, the cloak
of the old songs, guitars and accordion
to keep us warm. Looking forward, John.

2 Comments

Posted in Poems 2011

Tagged Elko, G Three Bar Theater, Linda M. Hasselstrom, National Cowboy Poetry Gathering, Western Folklife Center

SHORT HISTORY

Posted on January 8, 2011 by John | Leave a comment

Thick tan hide, deep acorns cut
worn dark and smooth by time
and horses ambling one-by-one
over the knoll – bays and sorrels,
some with chrome, a brown, a paint,
two duns – all with names
I remember in different places
that have not changed since
these tarnished silver conchos
squinted blindly beneath
the saddle strings, white
sun on the snow at the door
in Billy Maloy’s driveway.

The flesh was young then,
before winning the West
took a lifetime, made truth
an elaborate myth for men
to pass with coffee, or whiskey –
for women to correct and clarify
with facts that didn’t seem to matter
then, on this ground around
where canyons, trees and rocks
have kept their names,
for yet another generation going
gray with the seasons spun
like tigers into butter –

not that long ago, it seems.