Tag Archives: photography

EFFICIENCY

Posted on September 12, 2017 by John | 2 comments

@ 70, you try
to save steps, weigh
pick ups and deliveries
against carrying capacity
and memory hoping
not to forget
the grand plan
along the way—only
to find repetition
a good mental and physical
exercise in reality,
like it or not.

Shuffling his Florsheim wingtips
towards the hospital doors,
my father quipped, “A man has to
get used to being
not first in line.”

Change has not run off
and left us without humor,
without our backwards perspective
and subsequent syntax,
but thinking too far ahead
to save time, to insure
efficiency, we may miss
the moments we have
chosen to live for.

2 Comments

Posted in Photographs, Poems 2017

Tagged photography, poetry

PAY ATTENTION

Posted on September 11, 2017 by John | 2 comments

Everywhere we look
nearby news, activity
we can’t escape
unless we fly
above it all.

It takes a herd of eyes,
a flock of senses
to survive the wild
and domestic
intrusions

of this world.
No time to lollygag
when everyone becomes
someone’s breakfast.
Pay attention.

2 Comments

Posted in Photographs, Poems 2017

Tagged photography, poetry, wild turkeys

FIRELIGHT

Posted on September 10, 2017 by John | 1 comment

No manila folders, no alphabetical tabs
among the files of fuzzy memories, no
random access search of the mind, yet

the forgotten lie in wait like dry tinder
for a spark to fire and bring to light
lost episodes excised in the editing.

We write the shameful off like bad
investments, or like tuition spent
to improve our reflection. How soon

we forget—yet the perfect details
that with cold hard steel chip
gray flint red just like the first time.

1 Comment

Posted in Photographs, Poems 2017

Tagged photography, Pier Fire, poetry

First Wagyu 2017

Posted on September 9, 2017 by John | Leave a comment

For our own Age & Source Verification records, this season’s first Wagyu calf born September 6, 2017 from first-calf heifer 6141, not due until the 15th of the month. Initially a bit of curiosity for the rest of the first-calf heifers, this heifer calf is doing well, though a bit lonely with no one to play with.

New Life

Posted on September 8, 2017 by John | Leave a comment

SEPTEMBER

Posted on September 3, 2017 by John | 2 comments

First Angus calves – September 1, 2017

With the worst of summer heat behind us, our new year begins on September 1st, when our cows start calving. Since May 21st, we’ve had 83 days over a hundred degrees on Dry Creek, fiery streaks in memory. The ash and smoke from the Pier Fire in the Tule River drainage above Springville has wrapped us in filtered sunlight this past week, changing the color of nearly everything, but it’s a welcome relief to see the silhouettes of cows and fresh calves in the shade of oak trees, the new beginning we’ve been waiting for.

2 Comments

Posted in Photographs, Ranch Journal

Tagged cattle, photography

Country Living

Posted on September 1, 2017 by John | 5 comments

The romantic notion of country living often needs some seasoning of reality.

Tell Blanke, an incoming freshman at Cal Poly SLO majoring in engineering, noticed this rattlesnake crawling out of the rocks beneath the house where he and his mother Terri live along the Kaweah River in Three Rivers. By the time he got to the river’s edge the snake had crawled through his Aunt Tammy’s yard and was headed towards his grandparents’ house where he dispatched him. The Britten ‘compound’, as Robbin refers to this generational cluster of houses on the river, enjoys a sandy beach and excellent swimming hole most all summer.

For perspective’s sake, Tell is about 6’ 3” and still a bit shaky when Terri snapped this photograph yesterday with her iPhone. Our neighbor up the road has killed seven rattlesnakes from beneath their deck. Fortunately, Robbin and I haven’t killed any, but we’ve been keeping our eyes peeled.

5 Comments

Posted in Photographs, Ranch Journal

Tagged photography, wildlife

IN BLACK AND WHITE

Posted on August 30, 2017 by John | 1 comment

Tell me everything is normal,
that I have slowed as time
has accelerated change—

that there are people, out there,
trying to steal you away
with worry and fear,

trying to bait you
with their protection
like a coyote in a cage.

Tell me everything is normal,
that anything you say
can become criminal,

that all the double-entendres,
similes and metaphors,
all the poetic devices

may be held against you
someday. It was serious
in the fourth grade:

a love note to Denise
promising marriage
and devotion falling

into my parents’ hands—
a mortifying lecture
to be careful what I write.

1 Comment

Posted in Photographs, Poems 2017

Tagged Cooper's Hawk, photography, poetry

Cooper’s Hawk

Posted on August 29, 2017 by John | 2 comments

The arrival of the Cooper’s Hawk several weeks ago has thinned the coveys of quail around the house, required scouts and sentinels as they’ve quickened their step. Likewise, he’s had to change his roost as they’ve learned where to look. Startled at my desk to a flutter beyond the door, he was perched on the railing, waiting for the quail to come off the hill to water. Six feet away, this photograph is softened dramatically by both window and window screen.

I missed the shot, however, when he tried to fly through the windowed door, wings outstretched and talons hung in the screen door. It surprised and scared me enough to be spellbound, another moment where I have to be satisfied to brand it in my mind.