One more cigarette for the young dog to piss and poop, to explore the garden, check-out the squirrel holes before I load her up. One more cigarette to let the split oak set before I stack it. One more cigarette and a cup of old coffee to inhale November.
Posted in Photographs, Poems 2020, Ranch Journal
…he fed the young flame with wisps of dry grass
and with the tiniest dry twigs.
– Jack London (“To Build a Fire”)
A fair piece from the Yukon,
Jack—nothing warms cold bones
like a good fire. We, too, need
a flame to feed a woodstove
oak, the standing dead and fallen
to adversity and time,
and start with broken posts:
split coastal redwood pencil-thin
into a chimney teepee thatch
on crumpled newsprint
before the match leaps to catch
a hungry blaze, inside
shadows dance and touch,
begging brittle Manzanita’s
hard red heart that dulls a chain,
severed limbs of lichened skeletons
wait to burn hot and easily
to prepare the seed, lick the oak
with fire. And glowing early
morning coals banked in ash
start Manzanita sticks a flash.
Dark morning without moon or stars
before the first winter storm, the day before
Black Friday rains deals and discounts
for Christmas, for our economy and I am
ever thankful that the bulls are out early
courting cows, meeting kids and family
before dirt roads get too slick to travel—
ever thankful for the drought that felled
two big Live Oaks on the gate and fence
we corded-up and stacked beneath the eave
before the girls drove posts and spliced
the barbed wire on a mat of green
to leave the mess looking like a park—ever
thankful for them, for you and this ground
we’re invested in together, for good horses
willing to get the cow work done—
black skies without moon or stars,
you and I alone before the storm.
Posted in Photographs, Poems 2016, Ranch Journal
Tagged bulls, cows, Dry Creek, firewood, friends, photography, poetry, rain
A man builds a house around a fire,
rocks and hearth upon the earth—
cuts wood to feed it, to stand close
to the flame when cold to the bone—
a luxury: he gets in touch
with the basics, with the tree.
Sometimes he says a little prayer
for the century felled or fallen,
or nods to hardwood cores intact
all his long life, stacking brush
for quail, cleaning up for grass
and cattle, like we’ve never been here.
Posted in Photographs, Poems 2014
Tagged Blue Oak, Dry Creek, firewood, photographs, poetry, wildlife
She knows her wood
and how long it will last—
loves Blue Oak coals
and the Live Oak with little ash.
Redwood splinters for an ember,
Manzanita for heat and flame,
she keeps a never-ending fire
three months warm each year.
Posted in Photographs, Poems 2014
Tagged Blue Oak, Calves, firewood, Paregien Ranch, photographs, poetry, wood stove
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