Tag Archives: wildlife

GRASS

 

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Within a week of late October rains, a forest
of green blades twisting, chasing warm
golden light between canyon horizons,

reaching while we sleep to a waxing moon
sailing south across black starlit seas—
a germination thick as hair on a dog’s back.

Hard clay turned soft underfoot, under cloven
hooves, out of the bleached and brittle rubble
of last year’s feed, a spreading miracle of green

as the earth stirs with another birth of grass.
And we are tied to it, mentally shackled
and physically restrained to work within her

moody generosity, daring not with word
or thought to piss her off—we have our gods
and goddesses we adore, stealing glimpses

every chance we get outside to pause
and praise them. All our totems, the bird
and animal people of the Yokuts know

our names, know our habits, show us the way
this canyon was designed to support life,
here and beyond us, with a crop of grass.

 

 

  Weekly Photo Challenge: “Chaos”

 

TREE FROG TALK

 

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I heard a rumor
that this world is much bigger
than we imagined.

 

TO LIVE FOR

 

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Late spring rains last into October,
empty-headed wild oats bow
to a southwest wind suggesting change

from broiling days—maybe rain.
Snakes crawl out from under shade,
backs to the sun, warm their bellies

in fine trail dust. Blue Oaks shed
large dark acorns glinting
in dry leaves like burnished gems

and we are rich, breathe deep relief
as fresh calves find steady legs
to run without direction, learn to stop.

We gladly give all up to chance
and certain change believing
this is the time we live for.

 

REDWINGS

 

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In the cattails, long leaves
like a thatch of swords
after a war, hem the water in—

veil the mud hens putzing
close to shore where bullfrogs
freeze in the sun

waiting for something good
to come along this irrigation pond
trying to go wild. I have come

to love their god-awful birdsong
like rusty hinges on a pipe gate
yodeling in the tight places,

musical cascades turned loose
to lyrics I still don’t understand.
I say I think they’re courting

because its spring, because
you and I have stopped
to watch them sing.

 

GIANT

 

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Checking water, hillside springs
plumbed to troughs, a coyote pup,
on the lope and looking back

as if heading home, is common.
Beyond the den, this is his home,
this is his water—we are

unknown intruders, enigmas
making rounds in these hills,
following trails to waterholes

where wild waits
and congregates
as it shrinks into August.

With our eye, we measure
flow at the end of rusty pipe—
with our lungs, blow water

backwards to the spring box
to clear debris and sediment,
seldom clean. Yesterday,

I got to be giant
with two tree frogs dancing
on my tongue.

 

Killdeer Nesting

 

 

Not far from the Roadrunner’s cactus nest, a Killdeer is also sitting on eggs. The shoulder of our gravel driveway usually offers three or four Killdeer a good place to hide and incubate their eggs. To keep from running over them, we’ve been known to place a rock close to the nest. Once hatched, the Killdeer takes her babies to the creek about 200 yards away. But barely running this year and last, we’ve only this one Killdeer nesting.

I had hoped to get photos of her broken wing act, her ploy to lure the dogs away. But she stood her ground yesterday to protect her nest.

 

Eurasian Collared Dove

 

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After a brief visit last spring, our count of Eurasian Collared Doves increased to four yesterday, including what appears (above) to be a juvenile, in just a matter of weeks. In order of appearance, the first pair began breeding and nest building almost immediately, followed by another male, then yesterday’s juvenile.

Pretty birds bigger than a Mourning Dove and slightly smaller than a Rock Pigeon, we’re not sure their presence is a blessing. Time will tell whether the most invasive species in Texas will become as big a nuisance as the Rock Pigeons, who thankfully disappeared last fall as their numbers dwindled through the summer.

The Collared Dove makes what has become an annoying two-syllable cooing sound just before it lands in a tree or on the ground where it feeds, that I can only describe as a distant baby crying, like the 1950s dolls that cried when you tipped them. Wiki notes that the species is ‘not wary’, that has connotations of stupidity for me, but I’d agree they’re fairly tame and unafraid, but observant enough to find our bird feeders immediately. The bird has many unique and interesting characteristics described in the links included here.

All About Birds

 

ON THE OTHER SIDE OF THE DOOR

 

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Hollow pipe songs at first light
pierce the darkness, own the dawn
with answered calls from oak trees

and granite piles of fractured rock
balanced on the edge of time
frozen around me. Early morning

solos grow into a chorus of chants
on the other side of the door,
a primitive awakening to greet me,

to ignore my circle of chores.
We’ve become part of the landscape
they return to, generations born

near cattle, horses and water troughs.
After these dry years, a colony—
a reunion of Roadrunners nesting.

 

FEAST IN THE FIDDLENECK

 

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Beneath the blankets
of fuzzy bloom, arms and legs
serve dinner for two.

 

 

AFTERWARDS

 

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Two centuries of women
gone beyond
healing and grinding,
needing shade
away from men—

dead Live Oak place
to roost for years,
our pair of crows
make familiar
flutters of love
balanced on a branch,
know one another’s
every feather,
preen and quiver
with how it feels
into the gloaming
afterwards.