Old black horse, tennis shoes.
I was ten, give or take a year or two,
driving cows and calves up Greasy
well-before they built the dam.
Dad hollering at the bunch splitting,
at me, at God, at everything.
You asked me then when we were done,
if I wanted to be a cowboy?
Tear streaks dried like a second skin,
I cried, “No!” and meant it—
horseback, just below Spoon Rock.
Amid the green, we have become old men,
of all the things we could have been,
going slow, just below Spoon Rock.
Posted in Photographs, Poems 2014
Tagged "Hay for the Horses", Gary Snyder, Greasy Creek, photographs, poetry, Spoon Rock, weekly-photo-challenge
Posted in Photographs, Poems 2014, Ranch Journal
Tagged Calves, cows, Dry Creek, haiku, photographs, poetry, weekly-photo-challenge
A taste of rain tinkling in the downspout
too light to hear upon the metal roof,
yet under this common wet covering
her scent mends everything
for the moment, for another beginning
and we inhale it—lungs full of new life.
And when we pray, it’s to the Goddess—
mother, lover—for our sustenance,
for the bloom and fruit of flesh renewed
as the damp earth exhales, breathes easily
to taste each lingering drop
that settles upon its petaled tongue.
Posted in Photographs, Poems 2014, Ranch Journal
Tagged Dry Creek, flower-friday, goddess, photographs, poetry, rain, water, weather, wildlife
Carnival colors
reflected on a breeze—
Disneyland for a duck.
Posted in Photographs, Poems 2014
Tagged American Widgeon, birds, Dry Creek, haiku, photographs, poetry, water, weather, wildlife
Dear Dawn, I await you in a cavern
of wet blackness, upstate exhaust hangs
between me and the suns and stars
of my reward, (or as far as I have seen
of infinity), as the dew from the last rain
clings to each unhealthy particulate,
camouflaged to look and feel like fog.
I have missed your smile, bright eyes,
and warm touch across the landscape
of my face, but we inhale this wet veil
holding clay slopes damp, moistening
each cotyledon struggling to break free
from the earth’s grip to make grass,
turn hills green with the circumambulation
of black dots—cows and calves grazing.
Another ugly day without you, feeding
hay in gray, but it ain’t all bad—
I’ll see you when I can. xxooxxoo, J.
Posted in Photographs, Poems 2014, Ranch Journal
Tagged bad air, Calves, cows, dawn, Drought, Dry Creek, feeding, fog, photographs, poetry, rain, water, weather
Posted in Photographs, Poems 2014
Tagged Calves, cows, Dry Creek, haiku, milk, photographs, poetry, weekly-photo-challenge
Posted in Photographs, Poems 2014
Tagged Dry Creek, Fire, friends, garden, haiku, neighbors, photographs, poetry, weekly-photo-challenge
Posted in Photographs, Poems 2014, Ranch Journal
Tagged haiku, Paregien Ranch, photographs, poetry, rain, San Joaquin Valley, weather, weekly-photo-challenge
Posted in Photographs, Poems 2014
Tagged Dry Creek, haiku, photographs, poetry, Strawberry Clover, weekly-photo-challenge, wildflowers
With rain upon the loose debris
of last year’s feed,
come first leaves of grass.
Posted in Photographs, Poems 2014
Tagged Dry Creek, feed, grass, haiku, photographs, poetry, rain, red-stem filaree, Walt Whitman, water, weather
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