No clock, no time—
free to look down
canyon home, the road
beyond to Lemon Cove
tied to railroad towns
up and down 99
two thousand feet below.
Through 150 hazy years,
much the same
to native eyes, to the wild
that have survived
our good fortune.
1.
Obstacles enough to keep this slow dance
interesting, to claim dexterity replayed,
we watch ourselves as movie stars sans
parade, glitter, or colored tabloid poses.
But the tempo and the tune are changing,
gearing-up with heavy guns for more
profitable exchanges, backroom deals
to satisfy the planet’s oligarchy, a lust
for luxuries yet to be imagined by mortals.
Frolicking pawns in this ascent towards
godliness, without remorse we emulate
with more consumption than the future
can afford for one last bash, the flash
of Armageddon, the sort of souls
the righteous have been waiting for.
2.
Busy in place away from the mainstream,
we are forgotten shepherds tending flocks
on uneven ground, looking to the sky
for rainstorms, for a sign of the tsunami
we trust will roll over us in canyons
of little consequence or significance
for bigger fish to fry. We have survived
what the crumbling skeletons of trees
have not—we have learned to adapt.
3.
You and I, dear friend, who do we write for?
Who among the muses sits closest to our senses?
Who among the deaf do we want to hear
these word games, these songs in praise of grit
and grace, the heartbeat drum off wild tongues
we’ve tried to tame with a clever vernacular?
For the few of us, I suppose, we sing new songs
to the same old choir, the brother and sisterhood
of the page, for the ricochet of words
in one another’s minds, we reach to validate
some sane compassion common among us
before the storm, the holocaust, whatever.
Summer water banked
above thirteen thousand feet
to leak as needed.
How many head
in a lifetime counted
through a gate—
daughters of daughters,
all the young mothers
and their babies
flow in a stream
of concentration, all
the loose ends of living
in a larger world
shut away, yet
clamber for attention.
Phones are ringing
in your mind
you dare not answer
until you’re done—
good practice
for the rest of your life.
Behind the barn and horses
grazing evening time, beyond
our chorus line of sycamores
locking hands gleefully,
young mothers pepper green,
return home to fresh feed
with branded calves—slope bare
for years without rain.
Breathing deeply, we inhale
all before our eyes—
herd and family without
the scattering sort of bulls,
they glean the sweetest first
before working
up the mountain gradually.
We want to freeze the feeling
in a photograph forever,
knowing we cannot.
Silt and sediment have settled
with the senses, clear water calm
in the canyon, low whispers
of the Solstice among the cobbles,
the easy pulse of our lifeblood
returns the churned edges
of the creek to house-hunting
killdeer pairs, not quite ready
to commit to gravelly real estate,
not quite sure of the shoreline
as we gather for another branding:
little bunch of big calves, slow
dance of old people and horses,
buck and bawl of calves before
the fiery altar of yesteryear.
Everyone’s got a job on the ground,
in the smoke, in the canyon, dancing
in the branding pen—syringes, taggers,
knives and irons—stepping ‘round
fat calves stretched one after another
before finding their mothers waiting
at the gate for children after school.
The smart and hard-to-gather
black white-faced cow looks
a little rough in your cell phone
photo, but after twenty-two years
she knows the routine—bringing
her last year’s calf you missed
to the corrals for weaning.
for Kenny & Virginia
We replay the day
of branding calves, glad
your horse has healed
beneath me strong—
the feel of the rope
remembered as our eyes
follow the eagle’s flight
low across the green
trolling for ground squirrels
busy with housekeeping,
absorbing the sun
after months of rain.
He stops mid-air
on his second pass,
falls back and plunges
into the grass, wings
shielding warmth within
his taloned grasp
as we talk and share
binoculars, checking on
life in this canyon—
of going nowhere
like the eagle
already home.
A beautiful day for a branding at Steve and Jody Fuller’s place on Dry Creek. Just up the road, we arrived while the crew was sorting cows from calves, hoping to keep the day’s work light for Robbin’s horse Bart who has been off a year to heal torn tendons—one of those freak accidents incurred, we believe, while he was playing in the pasture—the horse she lets me brand on. Lately, she has been testing him with some easy days successfully, and it was time try him back in the branding pen.
When I was younger, I craved to go to brandings as much for the bravado and camaraderie of this community as to rope calves. But in recent years, as my knees have gotten worse, about the only time I’m horseback is to help the neighbors brand, my gesture to repay them for helping us mark our calves every year. At times, it got to be work I endured.
For the past six months, however, I have been dreaming of horses and my knees don’t hurt as much when I ride as when I walk. To feel Bart’s strength under me as we led that first calf out was exhilarating, and to be able to free my mind of his physical soundness and concentrate on the feel of my rope became so much fun that I felt young again. Much of the credit I give to Robbin’s horse, he fits me well—yet knowing, too, that much of it just plays pleasantly in an old man’s mind.
Smoke in the air,
shade of this oak and sycamore
sixty years ago,
I pushed calves
to the iron roper:
pivoting table, rope and pulley
for vaccination, castration,
swallowfork and a brand
before they got big—
fifty head,
two men and a boy
in a short morning.
A counter-intuitive art
staying close
to save your shins,
yet keep the shit
on your jeans
to a minimum—
good practice
for a kid on the way
to become a man.
drycrikjournal 