Evening conversation dwells
on a thin cow, vaccine
protocol and the dog’s limp
without a hint of politics
beyond the barbed wire—
beyond this ground and grass.
We don’t want to know
what makes the news—
what makes the outside world
tick with greed and power.
Evening conversation dwells
on more important things.
It could be heaven
if the girls across the canyon
cared, if they worried
about the time of day
or year when green
turns straw-blond dry.
They are spared
the human condition—
graze until they die.
What will you do? She asks. I will
continue north, carry the past in my arms, flying into winter.
– Jack Gilbert (“BRING IN THE GODS”)
Might we say
we leave the past on the page,
chapbooks bundled in our arms
heading north into the storm—
time-faded faces,
moments tagged
into poems.
We know their names
and cherish visions
with vibrant clarity
like a bell chiming
on a wind gusting
across the canyon
of time behind us.
Three score and ten
more, I am reluctant
to let go
of this life
in exchange
for something more
like fulfillment
everlasting.
The tourists came
from Germany,
parked outside the pen
along the road,
brought cameras
and watched us
head and heel,
stretch and throw,
cut and vaccinate,
burn a brand
in a swirl of smoke.
We held our breath,
exchanged languages,
said goodbye
in pleasant tones
we understood
as universal
between bunches.
Posted in Photographs, Poems 2019
Tagged branding, Craig Ainley, Matt Wells, photography, poetry
The Elko undercurrents
often missed by journalists,
the thoughtful streams
of love and long respect
retained for old friends—
those profound associations
not secreted away,
but obvious.
My right hand offered
held in his both
as he contemplates
my eyes, and I his.
We breathe deeply.
Two gray old men
standing silent,
face to face
stretching time
within a loud crowd,
we block the aisle
beside a tableful of friends,
warm food and wine.
We know we are rare
birds in these fast times,
reading, writing poetry—
reaching for what we know
exists: like the language
of horses, cattle and people
who live on the land
it takes a lifetime to learn
and understand.
for Joel Nelson
Posted in Poems 2019
Tagged Elko, Joel Nelson, Machi's, National Cowboy Poetry Gathering, NY Times, poetry
When Zinfandel heavens part between rains,
we lift a glass of Cabernet at dusk
towards their fleeting magnificence
before the storm, beyond our reach
or responsibility, helpless but to bask
in the fading light of certain truth.
nothing left but a river flowing on the borders of heaven.
– Li Po (“On Yellow-Crane Tower, Farewell to Meng Hao-jan Who’s Leaving for Yang-chou”)
Branding big calves an hour from the asphalt,
snow-laden Sierras dressed in diaphanous clouds
a stone’s throw across the North Fork canyon
from these corrals too short for modern cows,
we talk about the pressure-treated posts you set
six foot down back when I can’t remember.
Away from the world for years, you are both here
and beyond the Great Western Divide,
a fuzzy white river flowing south to somewhere.
for Gary Davis
Fresh after-storm clouds,
of shadows climbing hillsides,
evening moon on snow.
The stage is set with
few days between rains
in years between droughts—
green hills hang fire,
begin to breathe
before they flower.
Knee-deep white egrets
comb blades of grass,
step lightly slowly
as tree frogs gather
to rehearse
an all-night chorus.
Last two hundred years,
six days afire—forgotten
ash and sediment.
(click)
