Lupine purple lupine & deep
Mountain blue on right
Lupine blue, blue lupine
& Blue then turns white
Chaparral down in Mule Creek on
Left & the sliding rocks betray
A coyote after, fawns
& their spring time slow
Lupine purple lupine
White ones now grow
Uphill trail gives it up to a saddle back
& Lupine blue & white all the way

Acorn woodpeckers zoomed between the oaks
Ka k aka akaing to their machine gun ridden hidey holes
On trees, snags in a dead limb & a power pole, & sometimes
Under the eaves of our house,
Colonial birds these in
Oak trees, birds — a 100 or more in all
& three breeding pairs four at most,
On the Oregon side-hill near a 20 acre farm black&white
Black & white red heads Ka k aka ak kaing zooming  up & down between
The farm house, the guest house & the barn,
& a crack of a  twenty-two &  a
Miss & the second shot tumbles the little flying cop car
out of the tree & out of the sky, with iron peep sights, &
The boy’s been given charge— “kill ‘em all,” he said,
“They’re drilling holes in our house!” it was not too
Serious, but a bird or two a week fell, examined then tossed aside
Years later in text book he read of their nature with all
Breeding pairs when killed or predated, became new breeding pairs & all would
Become breeding pairs if need be, for a steady population
& this was the answer to the fact that the birds never went a way,
While the oaks were there spreading out
Over the house the hillside & making those summers cool when it was
Hot, and the wood peckers flew, and bred and laid eggs
In their hidey holes, high in oaks where a little rot could
Be hollowed out in a spring time banging sound &
With the heads sticking out, Ka k aka ak kaing
& this small misunderstanding seemed to make
No less harmony on the hill, with our sheep, & steers
& a ground squirrel killing border collie, but
Now I look on Google Earth & see the oaks are gone —all of them
The cedars were taken out 25 years ago, &
I know now the woodpeckers have finally departed, &
I haven’t been back
Since these new people fell the cedars—I’m no druid
But the oaks were there three hundred years,
& the woodpeckers had a colony for at least that long
& though it’s perhaps the worst thing I could think of to say, but
To have them back, I would stay—300 years

Having panted
In the early summer heat
A quarter mile away,
A doe drinks
From a heated
Brackened pool
Small rolling
Just dislodged
Rocks from a dry
Hillside, brings
Long eared attention
To  break in hot silence,
Warm drops break circles
On the surface from a
Black nose poised
To listen & then
Drink again

Not..
That hospitals
Are bad if you
Need one

I must admit
Other plans have
Not prevailed
But writing
This poem

Being better
Than the altrnative,
& if this is the last
One I’d recommend the
One before

Though this
Is no dark
Thing I’ve been
Pulled back before

A woman moans
From across the hall
From pain while their protocol
Can’t help she moans on & on
Nurses don’t want to bother Doctors
some do & care Clara Barton
Ministering Angels not stopping
To inquire who’s on the list
The rest is triage & a corporate dice roll
Save prayers of sisters, prayers of brothers,
Prayers of Fathers, prayers of Mothers.

sandpipers take formation
from the beach/tiny
wingflutter up
hundreds
a sight of motion wall
of movement
together separate integral
& connected aeronautical mobius
form&contention
then away
to alight a distance
short of an incoming tide
visual concert
of communal fidelity
now,
individual
beach walking
sandflea eaters

there is a Weaver
in a breath
of folded willows
covered by
morning fog rising
off warmer
water
air
lifting treadle
at an exact moment
to blend it all
& make warp & woof
invisible
as it is
only talked of
while crossing
fibers of primary
existence
& we think
we live
off a fabric
of emptiness

The house was on the corner
At the edge of town,
Chinese elms in
Front yard & until I was seven
A large sycamore tree spread
Over the corner & diminished
The buzz of the grain elevators
Across the street but one day
The city came & cut  it down
When my father was
Out of town, & all
Even though it was my
Grandmother’s tree,
She played under as a child,
As was I, that morning
& I remember her weeping
& wringing her apron
As it fell to the ground

The two story home was built around 1900
West porch was slat board  &
Screened in & had a little furniture, the front door
Was screened & then you came on the porch & to a wooden door
With thumb button latch, & opaque glass
Gave way at waist height, walking through the
Door was a round oak dining room table of some size
A deer head mounted on the wall was from an era
Of  lesser taxidermy skill & was even a little ragged, as a child
But it was  the only deer I’d ever seen
& my grandmother every Christmas
Put a red nose on it

There was a china cabinet about chest height w/ a narrow mirror
It was made of a dark stained wood & in the bottom my grandmother
Kept my father’s war medals, a Silver Star & Purple Heart
The ends of the cabinet that recessed the mirror had posts &  one had a false front
That held papers unbeknownst to the casual eye
& a railroad watch, gold & jeweled and inscribed to my great grandfather

Beyond this room was the kitchen & bathroom w/claw foot tub
Beyond that another screened in back porch that also enclosed a trap door
To a cellar, for can goods, & tornado warnings every spring & summer

& a dark cloud rumbled & that certain prickly kind of feeling hung in the air
At night in May, 1955, & it all came up sudden & the storm sirens went off &
& wind hit our house hard like a ship hits a rock & I remember
Our dog being chained in the back yard by the minnow tank & from street lights I could see him
Being stretched out on his chain by the wind, & I’m grabbing for the door
To get him, as my father shoved me down
Cellar stairs, & the neighbors in the little red house didn’t come over like
They usually did & the wind stretched the house frame in an eerie creaking way
Then it all calmed down, & we found out the tornado struck ground
In Udall sixteen miles north & east of us, minutes later
& killed 87 people, &
the south half of that town was leveled,
& 200 were injured,
& my dog was alright & my grandmother stopped weeping for the sycamore tree