coyote so close

it’s not the sound so much
as the absolutly frenetic energy of the squirrels in the roof
that i have a difficult time with
(though it is also the fact that they wake me earlier
than my wristwatch alarm
is ever set for)
_______
like a pathology trish says in the kitchen
about how the doc at teh prenatal appointment (because she’s got coverage so she can)
about her 35 year old pregnant body
and all the wrongnesses
that can happen

_______
it jumped across the river
to washington shiz is talking
about the licks and bursts and too-hot heat
of the gorge wildfire
that took angel’s rest
which i have walked
again again and again
most likely never thinking
what it might be like
to lose all those trees
all that green
while at the same time never
taking the forest floor
the sturdy ferns reaching
the towering of it all
for granted
_______
jeaux, trish, ghana, em and me
with our happy salmon cards
in the uproar
switching and fistbumping and hi-fiving
in a frenzy and the great mess the cards in all their colors make
on the floor
_______
i’m grateful i have a strong body that can move jenafr says
about the six mile ride down the hill into town
and the six mile uphill home
_______
coyote sounds so close
i guess 50 to 100 feet
i pause
to take it 
all in

_______
more color  she says
about one of her new moon intentions

_______
no gaps, no signs of rustyness i affirm
about a certain return
to a certain playground

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morening

in the dark, awake
before brightness
how i watch light and color (through leaves and limbs) seep in

_______
good morening i write(that’s like a morning with more morning in it)

_______

hot pink confetti
jumping out of envelope as i
slice it open
how i laugh at the cascade
landing
on floor
on earth
on thigh

_______
clyde in the truck bed
ty and i in the front seats
eric and cynthia in back
ty and i peanut gallerying
marathon ridiculous joke style
for 15 miles (with breaks)
and how dotite
should have been there too
(i had this great dream the other night,
thought i’d cut it up and serve it for dinner too)
______
this bean – green and planted and plucked by our hands, a prayer
so goes the first typewritten line
of a poem 
for baigs

while the sky moves

the shower of so many walnuts
thumping, thwacking, banging down
onto the metal roofs of the sugar shack, the mill and cool ranch
in the morning winds picking up
announcing another storm (to follow last night’s) rolling in
_______

the rustling of seeds as they land in shallow plastic tub
sprinkle by small sprinkle from each cosmos flower ready to give
while the sky moves from blues to pinks
and shadows travel long into the east

_______

the photos coming in from jeaux
of gibbous the orange red blond cat:
lounging under the small garden cart,
kicking it on the 55 gallon drum,
perched on the woodstack
_______
soft cool wet ground
under bare feet
while rain pounds
where else does one just get to do this
(wake up and walk ‘to work’ [through the woods and through the yard])
in scrappy clothes and bare feet
(an acknowledgement: it is a privilege to have shoes and choose not to wear them)

with a swiftness

the thank-you note in my scrawl
addressed to ghana regarding the delicious and perfect chocolate chip cookies
_______
the sweat in beadlets along the curve of baigz’s back
as a small crew of us move through the patches of recently germinated carrots
thinning and weeding
in the hoophouse heat
_______
sparkle and spice written
on the tell-tale blue (a mini banner)
affixed to the silver holographic pencil
just under its hot pink eraser topper
liek the pencil has an announcment to make
which it does
_______
a list of symptoms addressed
to dr. danger
read in the hammock
where white pine limbs and needles plus wind
make that particular and most magnificent sound
as if the needles are combing the air that moves through
_______
as seen from the back road
where two cats (mama and ashby) trot behind me
hwo the low cloud is dark/gray and it moves with a swiftness over the higher puffier whiter cloud
and that’s not even to mention
all the varying edges
and orange pink light and how earlier
emory exploded through the front door while some of us sat to dinner
exclaiming it was so beautifullllll!!!!! about the seriously
highway-to-heaven sunray sky
he encountered on the ride home
_______
rough concrete of the cistern top below me as i recline under sky
and take in flashes of light that travel the clouds heading east –
how at their edges, constellations reveal themselves
_______
another light-a-candle-don’t-turn-on-the-lights night
in which, before i light the candle,
i loft-lay in the breeze of the fan at the end of what might be the last 90-degree day of the season
to watch the green world glow and darken
in the lightning
_______
the sound of ashby’s claws in the screen
wanting in 
but i don’t let him because it might be
too warm inside
for his comfort
_______
from the water world:

 

A Hindu devotee performs “Pind Daan” – rituals for the soul of ancestors – in the river ganges at Phaphamau, Allahabad, India – voice of america, day in photos

crown down

reading the address of a company on the back of a package – (unnamed phenomenon):

how one can become wistful over a zip code, even just the first three digits
because their whole body knows
the taste of all seasons there and
the sensations of biking the ridges and neighborhoods and river paths and bridges there
and over time, how the learned the names of everything that grew around them
______

all the little persimmons l ined up
(crown down) in my windowshill
in all shades of green to dusty orangepink
plucked from fallen branches
just outside my door
_______

ya’ll are beautiful!!! i call out
when the dennis birthday memorial ride forks
sending baigz and i left and the rest of the crew to the right
and at this distance i can see the great glow of all the lights parading and the bikewheels spinning

all the crumbs

adult raccoon and young one not far behind
scooting across the gravel road i run on
five feet in front of me
_______

post-run snack plucked right up
from the foresty floor:
persimmons – perfectly soft and what is the name
for the feel of that soft fruit skin against my fingers
and then there is the entire branch heavy with fruit
that broke off and now hangs from a peg outside my room
for the purpose of ripening, but also looking like a quite fine fall decoration
_______
the flurry and yellow/gold of bees funneling
in and out of a little tunnel/pit in the ground in lemony morning light
alongside the path down towards the old canada road
where we usually don’t drive the tractors through if it’s even the slightest bit wet
because they always get stuck
_______
cynthia braces me for the sadness
of the carolina parakeet
people would shoot at it for sport
and the thing about the carolina parakeet is that
when one of the flock dies, they all come to gather around it
reminds me of (white) people shooting at bison
from train windows
just because there were so many and
just because they could
_______

how i get down on the astroturf floor
in the empty upstairs of the mennonite store on highway two
(where one can serve themselves their own soft serve ice cream)
to cuddle with the stuffed animal tiger
sprawled out on the floor,
and it doesn’t stop there – ghana and i take turns hugging the hippo, the crocodile, the pig, the various kinds of dogs, the sheep, the elephant and trish cuddles up with the panda
and i joke about meeting our
hug quota for the day
and even though they are just stuffed animals (well, i always thought they were alive anyway),
my heart feels squishier and my body lighter afterwords
_______

all the crumbs the dutch letters leave (in this case, S’s) on ghana and trish and i
after we delight in the final food indulgence of our day
out on highway two
hitting up all the amish and mennonite stores
_______
trish showing me one of the 
happy salmon moves
(flapping a hand against another’s forearm)
in preparation for a game she suspects i’ll love
and based on this alone, her suspicion is correct
_______

mid-september sunset
(sky so crispclear
and the contrast fo clouds against it –
some in the general shape of a great spine curving along the southwest edge of sky
and light lowering (orange)
and how somehow it all smells/tastes/is colored something like
a september taos sky
(a call from three septembers past echoing out into the future – now)

in the fields of frivolousness

ghana in the kitchen at breakfast time and lunch time too
joking about eating off my plate again
(in reference to the times he was munching, unknowingly, on the apple slices i had cut and placed on plate
for myself)
_______
emory and i arguing
(the fun/play kind of arguing)
over whose hand landed first
and who gets to take which cards
in the great rainy morning game
of slamwhich
_______
still looking for my own language
for words like ‘missing’
but for now i’ll just say i felt you
in the fields of frivolousness today
_______
from the water world:

Vessels that sank during Hurricane Irma are seen in a Saint John bay, 12 days after the devastating storm raked the island, on St. John, U.S. Virgin Islands. – voice of america, day in photos