Tag Archives: poetry

TWO SIDES TO LUCK

Posted on March 17, 2020 by John | 2 comments

Mid-afternoon, after-rain beneath cottony cumulus
with sails set north trailing the long-awaited storm,

a lone coyote’s husky bark, cows and calves
across the creek frozen alertly upon the green—

I must assume the feral pigs now have had their fill
of the young bull I had to kill two weeks ago

with broken leg sunk deep into a squirrel hole
while sparring with his mates passing idle time

with unemployed testosterone awaiting the long,
hog-truck trip home to a feedlot in Idaho.

Stiff hide and disconnected bones don’t care
having filled the bellies of our sanitary engineers.

2 Comments

Posted in Photographs, Poems 2020, Ranch Journal

Tagged photography, poetry

IDES OF MARCH 2020

Posted on March 15, 2020 by John | 3 comments

Reading this, you
have survived the wars
by wit or luck
to suffer more.
It is our nature
to endure

when nothing,
that eternal dark emptiness,
remains the same—

when nothing
escapes change.

Inside my rabbit hole:

               last spring’s late rains
               brought pneumonia
               killing quail chicks
               while turkeys thrived
               and multiplied.

               This spring dry
               beneath mostly
               empty clouds,
               a carpet of golden
               fiddleneck
               beneath hard hills
               turned brown.

Beyond my hide-away:

               a scuffling of men
               (and women, too)
               changing places in line—

               some running for election,
               some running for cover,
               some running in fear
               to empty shelves
               to stay alive.

It is our nature to endure.

3 Comments

Posted in Photographs, Poems 2020

Tagged photography, poetry, rain, weather, wildflowers

REPRIEVE

Posted on February 23, 2020 by John | 4 comments

She didn’t stay long
or leave much in the way
of puddles,

her fine gray mist
to brighten green,
settle dust

and relieve the pain
of waiting
for a well-begged rain—

a sniff and taste
to lure us closer
toward our reward

like this cold dawn’s
chimney smoke,
flat to the ground,

drawn up-canyon
following her
discarded clouds.

February 23, 2020
0.15″

4 Comments

Posted in Photographs, Poems 2020, Ranch Journal

Tagged photography, poetry, rain, weather

OUT OF DARKNESS

Posted on February 20, 2020 by John | Leave a comment

Alone in the dark
that shrouds anemic green
and short-stemmed fiddleneck
thinking February seed,

               the joyful gurgle
               of a shrinking creek
               gulps over cobbles

               to sit beside me
               on a cold and moist
               down-canyon breeze.

               Painted black,
               all sounds normal
               as if a sign.

Alone in the dark
I color hillsides leaking
beneath gray skies.

THE FAR CRY

Posted on February 19, 2020 by John | 3 comments

A single pod of seeds, the bare
redbud volunteer, come spring,
will obscure my view of the road;

the world beyond this black morning—
beyond the owl in the oaks above me;
the cobbled mumbles of the creek.

With the hillside chorus of coyotes
and canyon’s replies, the ridgeline
holds-up heaven’s brilliance

in a sky of stars—unabashed
and unafraid of any circumstance
that may engulf us all.

3 Comments

Posted in Photographs, Poems 2020

Tagged nature, photography, poetry

FEBRUARY 2020

Posted on February 11, 2020 by John | 5 comments

Another cold dry front
rests upon the tops of hills,
shapeless clouds, a haze
upon steep south slopes,
red clay like brick—
green pales to gray

               as we brand calves
               one by one
               we may sell early
               with their mothers.

I brace against the familiar
drama, growing numb

               as my stiff new rope
               slides through the palm
               of time’s softened hand,
               warming as it searches
               for my frayed
               wrapped-cotton horn.

               I quote my elders
               dead and gone
               as they visit
               the branding pen.

Don’t worry, Dofflemyer,
E. J.’d say.
It’s gonna rain.

It takes years to get here
with cows we like—
unwritten contracts
they understand

               as we discuss
               our options
               of who goes first
               and who gets what’s left
               of hay.

Of the two of us,
I am the dreamer
and believer—

a luxury
you have allowed me
facing facts
as I grow gray.

for Robbin

5 Comments

Posted in Photographs, Poems 2020, Ranch Journal

Tagged Calves, cows, Drought, photography, poetry, weather

Elko 2020

Posted on February 5, 2020 by John | 5 comments

On our way home from the National Cowboy Poetry Gathering in Elko, Nevada, Robbin and I replay a collage of meaningful moments, fragments of conversations, poetry and music as we cross the Great Basin. Avoiding I-80 and Donner, taking the longer, southern route over Tehachapi instead, it has become like Groundhog Day, both coming and going over the years as we cross the pastel sagebrush expanse of the high desert.

Since 1989, I’ve watched the Gathering evolve from strictly traditional recitations to more contemporary expression rooted in a hands-on, rural ethic of the livestock culture where a man’s word is still his bond, where neighbors trade labor and the land offers a living for those tough enough to endure the whims of the weather. With more hugs than handshakes, it has become a reunion where respect remains high, but we’ve lost a few of the best along the way.

With many new faces, an obvious effort to inject some youth into the offering, it was invigorating and inspirational. Included in a great session with poets Forest VonTuyl from Oregon, Jonathon Odermann from North Dakota and singer-songwriter Tracy Morrison from Idaho, I was assured that the National Cowboy Poetry Gathering will survive with renewed energy and originality. My kudos to the staff for locating so much young talent residing in the West.

I always look forward to visiting and reading with one of my favorites, Patricia Frolander, past-Poet Laureate of Wyoming, pictured above. Robbin and I will continue to replay the moments as we get down to the business of branding calves. It’s good to be home.

5 Comments

Posted in Photographs, Ranch Journal

Tagged Elko, National Cowboy Poetry Gathering, photography, poetry

UNDER PRESSURE

Posted on January 20, 2020 by John | 5 comments

                                                            every valve
                                                            leaks a little
                                                            there is no

stopping the flow.
– Gary Snyder (“Fixing the System”)

I worried once
about wasting water,

steady drip

at the trough,
at the hose bib,
at the gate valve

green year-round

gathering tree frogs,
snakes and cottontails.

Raining crystal drops
rising with Greenheads
from the tailwater
of the irrigated pasture

               on a Sabbath
               with my father
               instead of church:

he spoke into the clouds.

               With the gravity
               that holds us close
               to this earth,

                              always a little
                              leaks by
                              to remind us.

5 Comments

Posted in Photographs, Poems 2020

Tagged Cooper's Hawk, Gary Snyder, photography, poetry

IF ROCKS COULD TALK

Posted on January 16, 2020 by John | 7 comments

                     The old granite stones, those are my people;
                     Hard heads and stiff wits but faithful, not fools, not chatterers;
                     And the place where they stand today they will stand also                            tomorrow.
                                 – Robinson Jeffers (“The Old Stonemason”)

Some like headstones thrust into the earth,
or weather-carved phallic outposts
natives knew by name, those are my people,
my landmarks nodding now as I pass.

They have grown cold and taken shape
from the fires of molten violence—
cracked and fractured piles, wisdom
scattered in the grip of gravity at rest

to hum as homes for rodents and reptiles,
a tunneled settling of colonies to feed
a wilder world. Some pulse with life,
dress with thick green moss, after rain.

But those tattooed with colored lichen
first draw the eye to unravel art,
question what they seem to say—
all good listeners, patient to a fault.