Danger on Peaks (3 page)

E
NJOY THE
D
AY

One morning on a ridgetop east of Loowit

after campstove coffee

looking at the youthful old volcano

breathing steam and sulfur

sunrise lava

bowls of snow

went up behind a mountain hemlock

asked my old advisors where they lay

what's going on?

they say

“New friends and dear sweet old tree ghosts

II

Yet Older Matters

B
RIEF
Y
EARS

Hanging Out by Putah

Creek with Younger Poets

Sitting on the dusty

dry-leaf crackly ground,

freeway rumble south,

black walnut shade,

crosslegged, hot,

Yet Older Matters

A rain of black rocks     out of space

onto deep blue ice     in Antarctica

nine thousand feet high       scattered for miles.

Crunched inside yet older matter

from times before our very sun

Flowers in the Night Sky

I thought, forest fires burning to the north!

yellow nomex jacket thrown in the cab, hard-hat, boots,

I gunned the truck up the dirt-road scrambling,

and came out on a flat stretch with a view:

shimmering blue-green streamers and a red glow down the sky —

Stop. Storms on the sun. Solar winds going by

A Dent in a Bucket

Hammering a dent out of a bucket

Baby Jackrabbit

Baby jackrabbit on the ground

thick furry brindled coat

little black tailtip

back of the neck ate out,

life for an owl.

Work Day

They want —

Short lengths of 1” schedule 40
PVC

A 10' chimney sweeping brush

someone to grind the mower blades

a log chain,

my neighbors' Spring work.

Asian Pear

The slender tender Asian pear

unpruned, skinny, by the zendo

never watered, ragged,

still puts out fruit

trunk scored with curls of bark,

bent-off branches, high-up scratches —

pears for a bear

Cool Clay

In a swarm of yellowjackets

a squirrel drinks water

feet in the cool clay, head way down

Give Up

Walking back from the Dharma-Talk

summer dry madrone

leaves rattle down

“Give up! give up!

Oh sure!” they say

How

small birds      flit

from bough

to bough to bough

to bough to bough to bough

Whack

Green pinecone flakes

pulled, gnawed clean around,

wobbling, slowly falling

scattering on the ground,

Tree-top squirrel feasts

— twitchy pine boughs.

Yowl

Out of the underbrush

a bobcat bursts chasing a housecat.

Crash — yowl — silence.

Pine pollen settles again.

April Calls and Colors

Green steel waste bins

flapping black plastic lids

gobbling flattened cardboard,

far off, a backup beeper

Standup Comics

A parking meter that won't take coins

a giant sprinkler valve wheel chained and locked

a red and white fire hydrant

a young dandelion at the edge of the pavement

Sky, Sand

Cottonwoods streambank

black phoebe calling
pi pi pi
here, near —

Mexican blackhawk cruising — squint at the sky,

shoes full of sand

Mimulus on the Road to Town

Out of cracks in the roadcut rockwalls,

clumps of peach-colored mimulus

spread and bloom,

log-truck breeze-blast

always going by —

they never die.

A Tercel is a Young Male Hawk

Falconers used to believe that the third hawk egg in a clutch would be a male. So they call a young male hawk a “tercel” from
tertius,
“third.” Who knows why carmakers name their cars the way they do.

Brighter Yellow

An “Ozark Trucking” bigrig pulls up

by me on the freeway, such a vivid yellow!

a brighter yellow than bulldozers.

This morning James Lee Jobe was talking

and the dark red Indian paintbrush down in Texas.

Said, “from a distance — them growing all together

Hey — keep on the right side

of that yellow line

To the Liking of Salmon

Spawning salmon dark and jerky

just below the surface ripple

shallow lower Yuba

River bed — old mining gravels

mimicking a glacier outflow

perfect for the redds below Parks Bar.

G
LACIER
G
HOSTS

Late July: Five Lakes Basin & Sand Ridge, Northern Sierra