Everlasting For a few weeks Bluebonnets stand erect, torching The breeze that reminds her There is a gulf. Far from it, The Llano carries itself Past bluff and granite. He stood awhile, watching her Watch the nutra As it swam up river. A witness Of another kind Filtered through the mesquite, […]
Read more "COME SPRING"One. Won. Two. To. Too. Four. For. Fore. Eight. Ate. Be. Bee. We. Wee. Flee. Flea. Pee. Pea. See. Sea. Key. Quay. Isle. Aisle. Rain. Reign. Rot. Wrought. Muse. Mews. Peel. Peal. Peek. Peak. Leek. Leak. Chic. Sheik. Week. Weak. Him. Hymn. (So far so good.) So. Sew. Sow. Sack. Sac. Sink. Sync. Cod. […]
Read more "ODE (OWED) TO THE ENGLISH LANGUAGE"When the roar of distant shore Ceases to please this pale frame The will of Life will have bore Down, erasing one lettered name. What is is stripped away to the core And, at once, is what once came. As the tide widens its shore Nothing remains the same. No niche of […]
Read more "SCRAPING THE HULL"Terraced but forgotten, Stones in a row After row after row. He looked one way. She looked the other. Bringing it back will Take some doing, he said. “Just like anything Neglected For too long.” But he Did not hear. (from Hill Country & Other Poems)
Read more "FIELD"I. The storm tears ‘round And the wind bears down On the rooted things. What is rooted will cling To the deep-set stratum. What is new will bring No strength from its planting. The new will cower under stormy stratus As rain beats into dying grasses. Storm! Tear ‘round! Whip the morning-glory! Near to the […]
Read more "LEARNING TO STAY IN ONE PLACE"Thank you, Peter Roget. Buried there On Threadneedle Street Under words complete, Undone and hyphened. Deciphering a garble With meticulous Devotion— A laundering and Folding, a Putting away neatly Of well-worn pronouns, Tucked in discreetly Between verbs fleeting And mating with Respectable nouns! The gowns of phrases […]
Read more "MR. THESAURUS"Here are the cawing of the crows; something other poets I like would write about. Here at the window I sit fixed like a guiding light for someone to come home by. The view from the room is like any view: looks out, takes in, spoiling the unenclosed. As I sit, the […]
Read more "AFTER A GREY MOON"The beef stay slaughtered In hosed-down houses. Mouses are caught in snap traps. Apples drop from the forgotten orchard. I sit stripping peas From their green pockets, Dropping the beads of green Into buckets. As luck would have it, The rabbits ravaged this year’s lettuce. Other than that, the garden fed us. Best […]
Read more "WHAT EVER EATS MUST DIE"Underground springs go on, Evidenced by mesquite And water pooled In the granite draw. She booted through the brass burrs Behind him, Her ropers and jeans Brushing against the prickly pear. There’s the rub, He called. Over yonder. One monarch flew above him. Traces of buck velvet Lay like tufted leaves Among […]
Read more "RUB"There where the sideoats grama grew They stepped, hand-in-hand, as the chief And his sister and the tribe had done two hundred Years before, up river, up on the bluff. A wall of rocks directed the buffalo Over the cliff, the San Saba waiting As only a river can do, while One lone heron […]
Read more "GRASS"