Gray canyon rain,
café au lait rivulets
overfill vernal pools
spreading to the creek
just begun to run
at the end of December.
She stayed overnight
and all day, lingering
to leave us extra rain,
as if we were old lovers
trying to give the past
a second chance—
she offers nourishment
to thirsty earth, bare slopes
a cover of color come spring:
a team of sunlit Wood Ducks
at the edges of water pooled
grazing with horses.
Posted in Photographs, Poems 2022, Ranch Journal
Tagged Dry Creek, photography, poetry, rain, runoff, vernal pools, water, weather, Wood Ducks
Dirt track before asphalt,
ruts in mud, December sycamores
after a rain waiting to undress,
like always—it feels the same
to escape upcanyon in your painting,
leaving main roads behind
before it was engineered
for 18 wheels to haul gravel—
town politics behind us.
Before the flood of ’55,
Terminus Dam in ’61,
much has changed
except for the feeling you’ve captured
of peaceful adventure
at every beginning of our road home.
for Myrtle Sue Redford
Posted in Photographs, Poems 2022
Tagged Dry Creek, Dry Creek Road 1946, Mrytle Sue Redford, photography, poetry, sycamores
Stacked in the valley
and thick as milk gravy,
it spills over the ridge
in slow-rolling waves
eclipsing the daylight
to swallow you up
in cold cottony gray.
Easy to get lost in the fog
when you can’t see
your horse’s wet ears—
find something dry
to start a fire
and wait for it to lift—
or trust he knows
his blind way home.
Posted in Photographs, Poems 2022, Ranch Journal
Tagged fog, photography, poetry, Tule fog, weather
This is not scripture it’s a dream,
a dream, the stuff our life is made of.
– Jim Harrison (“A Dog in the Tomb”)
Wild apple on a stick, we pray
it’s tart and tasty in our veins,
then to our hearts to play
on the cinematic screen
in our brains while we sleep—
when we check out of the mundane.
Wild apple on a stick, we pray
it’s fresh and full of mysteries
left to address, our flesh enlived.
Posted in Photographs, Poems 2022
Tagged alive, DREAMS, fresh, Jim Harrison, mysteries, photography, poetry, wild
After peeking beneath the eve,
the sun dives south beyond the ridge
near the Solstice. Time’s quick departure
into darkness begs moments stolen
around a fire, glass of wine,
2-for-the-price-one thin tri-tips
browning above hardy Manzanita coals
flicking blue and yellow tongues
into our eyes to clear them—
like standing in a gate opened
to a pasture of possibilities
yet ungrazed at this late date.
Posted in Photographs, Poems 2022, Ranch Journal
Tagged basic elements, camaraderie, clarity, family, photography, poetry
Inside, the basic tools,
wrenches, pliers and ratchets
under the back seat
to take things apart
and put back together
fixed, or so we hope
when working on ourselves—
but only if we know
how things work.
Posted in Poems 2022
Tagged be prepared, comfort, experience, Good Boy Scout, introspection, master of none, poetry, repairs, self help, tools
A mile from any cattle
a gang of three bulls
unloaded at work
on Friday, cows
strung out on hay
before it rained
and muddied roads
to not haul them,
were sparring on Saturday,
bawling and plowing
the new green brown
while the cows
rode one another.
Witness for over fifty years
I have my theories
where there is no proof,
I leap to speculation
like Sherlock Holmes
just for the entertainment.
The girls and babies
have climbed the mountain
for the new green
protected by old feed
to grow taller,
and the boys too cavalier
or lazy to follow after
their nine-month vacation
on alfalfa.
We breed for almost everything
these days: birth weights
and scrotal circumference,
marbling and tenderness,
weaning weights and dollars
(gentle purebred generations
of artificial insemination)
for everything but sex drive.
Posted in Photographs, Poems 2022, Ranch Journal
Tagged artificial insemination, bulls, photography, poetry, sex drive
Damp and cold, her breath
slips through the door cracked
to push the smell of smoke
through the house while it rains
lightly. I steal deep breaths,
pretend I’m young again
before I light another.
Though I miss the real storms,
the overbearing trepidation
that escapes its banks to flood
with heroic tales and wonder
when its over, I am now lifted
out of time on her breath,
this gentle rain, hillsides
running green—reborn again.
Posted in Photographs, Poems 2022, Ranch Journal
Tagged breath, Drought, photography, poetry, rain, shy goddess, time, weather
It’s quiet now, she’s come and gone
without a sound, spent the night
without a word as we slept
deeply by the fire. She kept it dark
without the stars, hid the pregnant moon
that shed the rain lightly through the clouds.
We don’t know her name, shy goddess—
but we will leave the light on
with pomegranate jelly at the door.
– – – – –
0.63″ plus bugs
Posted in Photographs, Poems 2022, Ranch Journal
Tagged clouds, Drought, moon, photography, poetry, pomegranate jelly, rain, rain gauge, stars, weather
An ever-play movie,
road in the distance
following the creek
wet or dry
up or down
a stream of SUVs
at 60 spaced militarily
from So Cal
to Christian camps
above Eshom
remembering Loren
on an ox cart load
of carp to dry
for the summer
CalFire trucks
twice a day
cattle neighbors,
goosenecks,
loads of hay
Badger locals
on shoulders parked
for first or last
cell phone service
sprinkled with tentative tourists
and strings of Harleys
roaring for or from
a burger at the Mountain House.
We believe we can read
everybody’s business
long distance.
Posted in Photographs, Poems 2022, Ranch Journal
Tagged Badger, body language, Cal Fire, carp, cell phone stops, Christian Camps, Dry Creek Road, entertainment, Eshom, Harleys, Loren Fredricks, photography, poetry, traffic
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