Word Anger

White-Throated Sparrow

2009-07-09T14:27:00.000-07:00

Light snowfall starts at dusk,
dusting boughs on the evergreens,
accenting the decks outer edge,
during the night the snow heavies up,

the dusting grows to pillows, the accent
is a drift. Close to the wall it's a great day
for a white-throated sparrow, it joins a gaggle
of seeders harvesting the feeder spillover,

a ground-scratcher's line dance,
the best peckings in the neighborhood,
then the weather changes.

Basket

2009-07-06T06:54:00.000-07:00

A reed basket hangs on the line
with flowers stuffed in its mouth,
the basket is the skeleton of a marsh,
the flowers cascading corpses,
the victims of mass murder by sickle and scythe.

Spirits of the dead at a prairie graveyard
lean against a fence rail
and think on friends who never returned
from an evening stroll.

Death thinks on a corpse
lost in a marsh, a corpse out of the box.
At the end of a row of gravestones
a basket ceremony fills in the blank,
murder reveres death.

The Moth Goes Around

2009-07-02T15:49:00.000-07:00

With new glasses I see the cobwebs
in my cabin, dust I only smelled
before, a moth flittering to dark places
in the printer, curious messages

crawling across the television screen.
Knowing evolutionary biology humbles
the path leading here, astronomical
physics troublizes the road ahead,

today's an egg learning about scrambled,
sunny-side-up, three-chili omelet.
Galileo puts two lenses together
to better see the River of Stars,

he puts away the glass but his thinker
never forgets the proposition,
knowledge that shoves orbits
out of round. I sit in the rocker

with my eyes closed and my thinker
remembers the moth going around the cabin.
The egg takes off its glasses, but it never forgets
which part of the chicken it comes from.

Islands

2009-06-29T14:05:00.000-07:00

My past is an ocean, some parts stormy,
some calm, but mostly it's all the same
texture, it all looks the same,
except for the memory islands

poking up through the waves,
they anchor my thinking.
Between islands I find empty space
in the ocean, there used to be a memory

here, a name, a face, a place
of shared events, it's eroded away forever.
As I get older island hopping
takes ever less time.

Thinking Ku

2009-06-28T12:21:00.001-07:00

an owl on a fence post
looks into my center –
nothing moves

~

an ice thin
covers the puddle
of turbid water

~

sunlight splashes
Sylvia Lake trail –
three girls on bicycles

~

the sun never sees
the scuff of snow
between trees

~

blue moss
on the garden wall –
water drips

~

sky's reflection
swims on a pond –
fish in the clouds

The Tribe

2009-06-25T12:56:00.000-07:00

I live in a state of sad affairs,
the Governor is photographed
with a high school basketball player
and she isn't even drunk,
the Fish and Wildlife Director

is caught with a gill net
and there's no bribe,
the Highway Patrol has a program
to accept bribes, we know these guys.

At the Bent Fork
the regulars come in early,
the old guys, nine coffees,
two pancakes, three butter-horns,
an orange juice, six scrambled,
hash browns, can we get a refill over here?

A young woman walks in,
she's under more surveillance
than a strip club, she's out of place
as a birdwatcher with a white hat,
and she doesn't look like us.

She has a smile that says
I'm not from here, please be nice,
if she comes back tomorrow
she'll be one of the regulars,
one of the sad affairs.

Wind Surfing

2009-06-22T11:29:00.000-07:00

A spring squall comes off the ocean
like a three-year old with a temper,
surf's up, and evergreen boughs dance
with a gust of wind.

Birds at the feeder flush up
and catch a dancing branch
for a belly churning carnival ride.

Wind-waves calm, the boughs settle down,
birds flitter back to the feeder perch
until the next breaker crashes in,
and the feeder birds go out on a limb.

Learning

2009-06-18T11:09:00.001-07:00

Thinker Steve goes back east of the mountains,
to Denver, and walks across the parking lot
to a classroom, a lecture hall,
a coffee shop, util it's time to leave.

He comes back to where the ground is uneven,
the hot air is a blunt weapon,
the scent is a mule named Barney.
The education did me some good, he says,
but the earth did me some better.

Pistol Jimmy gets in a brawl
behind the Buckhorn Tavern,
it doesn't end well.
Thinker Steve comes to the hospital
to visit the results. The air is bad

in here, says Steve, I can smell the plastic
parts, the glue, the industrial cleaner,
the people in here are going to get sick.
The nurse says I'm not feeling too good

myself. Thinker Steve grabs the nurse
and goes back to where the ground is uneven.
Pistol Jimmy says he's learned
enough about doctoring, it's time to leave.

Back at the Buckhorn
Bill Martin says let that be a lesson,
Pistol Jimmy doesn't take to lecturing,
it doesn't end well.

Rough Edges

2009-06-14T11:40:00.000-07:00

I came by that dusty petrified wood
on a desert ridge west of Fry
Canyon, we were resting on a ledge
in the sun, listening to a rock

wren, deep in the realm of thought.
I brought dusty home and cleaned
the dried mud off us both,
now he rests on the table

and I'm in the old wooden chair.
We are long past our prime,
my dusty friend, we have rough
edges, cracks and knot holes,

we also have a glass of wine
to rinse clear the mind.

Garbage Truck

2009-06-11T18:56:00.000-07:00

The early morning sun is starting to burn
a hole in the clouds over Porter Ridge.
Down the block a garbage truck
comes around the corner with a growling.

It spots me standing back on the porch.
Like a coyote it stops at each garbage can,
tips it over and dumps the rubbish
that a family shed like a cat sheds hair.

Coyote warily draws near the carport,
he fixes on a clanking dumster
with a broken wheel, coyote gulps
and swallows with a snarl.

This is not a reticent coyote
slipping through tules at a marsh's edge
on a frosted November morning,
this howling coyote clatters and bangs

around the corner to obsess
on the next street's shedding.

Part of the Dark

2009-06-08T12:22:00.001-07:00

Poetry's lover strolls to the end of town,
then circles back to the alley behind Willie's Tavern
where the guys are getting loose.
Willie's mouser is under the stair

getting bug revenge, Jimmy the Lip and Karen
look over a worn map of shallow thoughts,
Karen empties her pockets into the trash bin
to simplify her life, she simplifies her pockets.

The gang whoops it up in the tavern,
night sounds sneak out like incense,
Jimmy and the mouser come loose from time
and dance across the alley,
it's their turn to have the right of way.

Weeds grow in the pavement's cracks,
not aware their offspring will also be weeds.
Willie turns off the light, locks the door
and becomes part of the dark.

Intersection Ku

2009-06-07T11:11:00.001-07:00

a fork in the road –
in the midst
wildflowers

~

behind Moon Island –
the flood tide
runs into itself

~

a tiger beetle
stops buzzing –
scissor-tailed flycatcher

~

traffic slows
at the intersection –
spilled birdseed

~

under the tree
fallen apples ferment –
snoozing coyote

Thin Air

2009-06-04T11:59:00.000-07:00

Marita steps off the ranch house porch
into the desert cool, in minutes the sun will break
Pistol Ridge and there'll be a good heat on,
the kind that dries out rocks, keeps sage

close to the ground. Marita walks to the corral
where Brandy waits for a carrot, a currycomb,
a saddle, they ride up to Foster Flat
where a hundred head finish off the summer grass.

With the ranch house left behind
Marita drives the herd north over Keg Ridge
and on to the Moon Valley holding pens
where she gets a good price. The heat comes down

like a hammer and thins the air, Marita gets light,
lets loose the reins, swims up and surfs breakers
in the clouds, runs with the sundogs.
Swimming on thin air makes Marita uneasy,

she grabs the reins and rides Brandy hard
back to the ranch house.

Small Clouds

2009-06-01T14:34:00.000-07:00

Jackie and Albert watch small clouds
drift up Edna Ridge, they look
like yesterday's clouds,
and the day before that,

and before that. They all look
the same until one strikes
hot-anger lightening,
it's too late to get out of the way.

One cloud was rubbed the wrong way,
set on edge, pushed around
until it's primed and ready to fire.

Jackie and Albert go to the Center Tavern,
to an old plywood booth
across from the bar, have a dark beer
and listen to the piano player.

Jackie chatters on dream parcels,
they look like yesterday's dreams
and the day before that.

Memories drift through Albert's mind
like small clouds, he's set on edge,
and it's too late for Jackie
to get out of the way.

Taxers

2009-05-28T17:34:00.001-07:00

Taxers, like hyenas, pass
by the richly nourished and chase
the weakers to exhaustion, drain
their bodies, leave bits and pieces

for the jackals, and the jackals lean
back from the sidewalk table,
sip pricey tea, exhaust the bits
and pieces, and the hyenas find

another chaser. Taxers, like leaches,
know they can forever find one more
weaker to drain. Jackals, like lobbyists,
know they can forever find

one more hyena to dance.

Cooper's Hawk

2009-05-25T12:25:00.000-07:00

Wing flickers
straight-line

from a perch
to a patch
of desert scrub,

cartwheel down
on a fluster
of feathers

and squeeze out
the last chureep.

Drop Ku

2009-05-23T23:14:00.000-07:00

the cloud on Pistol Ridge
doesn't look back –
drips from trees

~

a falcon drops
on a feeding flock –
feathers in the wind

~

a winter storm
blows in from the ocean –
the sound of trees dropping

~

the sun sets
behind Hacker Ridge –
snow stops melting

View From The Inside

2009-05-23T09:44:00.000-07:00

My girlfriend shut the door before the last
credit card promotion, I forget her name,
she arouses my erroneous zone. I left a red snow
coat at the library last night, walked home

in freezing weather and didn't notice anything
amiss, maybe it's time to write about
end–of-life issues, views from the boarding home,
uh miss have we met? Have you seen the red snow?

Lost souls rise up beyond the clouds, Marjorie
dies in the night, she goes to the Moon. This place
is on the map but it looks different from inside,
the trails are in different places, I try to act

like I've been here before. In human time
rocks don't stretch and yawn, they don't sit up
in bed and watch the sunrise, they don't die
in the night.

The Path

2009-05-20T23:11:00.000-07:00

The old path to my cottage is paved
with chicken bones, owl pellets,
crushed legs in weasel droppings,
broken axles, broken promises,

blood stained wood chips, lost kisses.
I turn from the old path
and focus on the steep one
that goes on up valley

and into the clouds on Farewell Ridge,
the path paved with plum blossoms,
bird songs, a mythical beast
that speaks in a familiar accent.

My old feet don't want the steep,
but I still watch it from my kitchen window.

Smoke Creek

2009-05-18T11:11:00.000-07:00

This road came into the valley ages ago,
it comes east out of Wendell, bends around
the nose of Saddle Point, and wanders along
the north side like it has no purpose.

This road is an old man, he reaches the ridge
at the east end of the valley and can't decide
which way to turn, so he turns both ways,
south to Sutter Beach and north to Smoke Creek.

This dirt strip is a history, a swarm of ruts
mark a patch left soft in spring, soft contours
lead in and out of the dust hole,
a scattering of dimples and lumps evokes horses,

pronghorn, jackrabbits, an old wheezing bull.
Uncle Billy cranks up his grader
and gives the old man a shave,
trims the stubble of history,

scrapes off the ruts and washboard,
gets ready for next year's swarm of dirt bikes
and pickups, a scattering of tracks. Weather's turning cold,
this old road's going to rest under a snow blanket

until spring migrations come into the cottonwoods
at Smoke Creek and wake up the desert.

Shallow Water

2009-05-14T11:52:00.001-07:00

Out on the mud flats the heron wait
for the next tide to bring in tasty bits,
Jimmy and Buster are on the oyster boat
with a couple of beers, behind the smugery

my tribe doesn't expect to be taken seriously,
we are the six fishermen
sitting on lawn chairs in shallow water,
it's not lazy, it's restful.

In the kitchen Carol is chopping peppers
for the salad, she says,
"Did I tell you about Gary?"
Carol told me all I didn't need to know

about Ed getting arrested
behind Charlie's Tavern, Christy's flirting games
at her birthday party, the school teacher
getting fired. I have a cold,

there's great irritation around my head,
"No, what about Gary."

Dead End

2009-05-11T09:53:00.000-07:00

A dead end is always twice traveled,
once going in, prospecting,
and then looking back, the long way

back over covered ground.
A dead end is a worn path
to nowhere, a riverbank,

the face of a cliff, Karen.
There's no benefit to waiting around,
nothing will change, it's a dead end.

Muddy Trail

2009-05-09T18:09:00.000-07:00

The trail below Sylvia lake
crosses layers of hard clay
that go devious in a winter rain,
boot sucking glop, slimy

as political rhetoric, turns the path
to a glissade through sword ferns
and salal, the butt gets
it's own layer of rhetoric, boots kick

and scrape before they return home
but the slime sticks, for months.

Get Serious

2009-05-06T19:39:00.001-07:00

Bill's idea of fixing up to go into town
is kick the mud off his boots
so when he tells me I need to dress better
I figure I ought to get serious and listen up,

even his dog, Poker, takes notice.
He says I don't get enough respect
because of the blown out elbow on my work shirt,
the patches on my loggers, and my boots

are split out, he says my old T-shirt
needs help, and he's looking at my hat too.
Bill's going into town anyway
for a headlight and a bucket of roofing tar

so he gives me a ride to the new store, Lester's.
Poker waits in the truck while Bill and Lester
pick out a light blue button-down Pinpoint,
wool blend camel trousers,

slip-on kangaroo boots, a western style
wool vest, and a genuine Donegal wool touring cap.
After the credit card spasms I'm looking large
and Lester says, "Thanks Uncle Bill."

I take a 'get serious' look at Bill
and he says, "Let's go to the 'Bee' for lunch,
it's on my nickel." "I'd like to join ya, Bill,"
I says, "but you're not dressed to my standard,

and the way Poker sheds,
I'll find my own way back to the ranch."

Tactile Ku

2009-05-03T12:07:00.001-07:00

Sidney picks
guitar transcriptions
Bach never felt so good

~

Bottle Beach –
a fog shiver
crawls my back

~

it's warm
where you lean
on me

~

March air
feels like snow
melting on mud

~

on Benson Pond
the water holds close
a duck's bottom