Mt. Shasta

Mt. Shasta

Below the ruptured mountain top
Lies a strange and battered landscape.

Large rounded mounds of heaved earth
Were laid bare by fire and ash 150 years ago

Pock marked with black rock, basalt bombs
Once rained down the west and north face.

A cinder cone near the freeway continues to crumble
Scarce of trees or any living thing, a testament

to the lack of viable soil. After a hundred years
Gold brought people to this land, and the soil

Once again supported some wild grasses
And a near by valley grew strawberries.

A lone coyote follows a cattle herd
Hungering for some late fall calves.

This mountain will erupt again someday
But now there is much more in it’s way.

Klamath river

September Shorts

September Shorts

1.
A litter of oak leaves
Skitter across the porch
Turn into cat toys
On the afternoon breeze.
2
Acorns ping the tin roof
clatter and roll down to the gutters.
Raucous Jays hunt and peck
tossing tree debris right and left
anxious for a meal.
3.
Late September mornings come slower.
Cool nights raise river fog.
The slant of sun reveals
exhausted green, fading
magenta of dogwood.
4.
Brisk gray mornings yield
to brilliant blue-sky afternoons.
Wood smoke climbs the evening air.
Leaf piles gather children’s giggles,
while school books wait tables.
5.
With a great crack
a plum tree splits in half.
Every dog in the neighborhood growls.
The spindly plum is no match
for a bear escaping attacks
By climbing its little limp boughs.
6.
September salmon
Smell the change in the river
the run has begun

Smoke houses primed
apple wood and cedar, smudge
deep pink flesh on strings

Salmon harvest begins
Feeds people time and again
A blessing for all

From on High

Fair weather clouds
chase their shadows
across tangents of flat farm land.

A crazy quilt of sturdy brown
freshly plowed rectangles intersect
squares and circles of new spring plantings.

Cattle ponds polka-dot the landscape.
Deep emerald alfalfa
completes the food chain for dairies.

From above I see clouds
in a scape only high fliers know.
Thunderheads pile up in turbulent majesty.

What was once a flat plain of white
deepens to gray, cloud cliffs
part to expose land far below.

Rain, in a high altitude waterfall,
forms verga, never reaching the ground.
We dip and tilt as we traverse the Rockies.

Home is all downhill from here.
Desert dry wrinkled skin of earth
is cross hatched with roads.

Everywhere are the markings of man,
carving out some sort of civilization
from the sometimes stingy land.

Alive and well in NY

NY Spring

I think the word is muggy
when clothes stick and showering
does little to relieve you.

The hills here are old and
round shouldered. Green nobs
roll in all directions.

Caterpillars creep up houses
drop from trees, and
squish under foot.

By the sluggish Allegany
weeds grow tall
and woodchucks burrow deep.

Lightning splits the night sky.
Thunder wakens the whole house
and the temperature barely cools.

Trees and flowers are all in bloom.
Sneezes blossom along with them,
and the air is almost too heavy to breathe.

50 mile Tour de cure
Bob Brannan, Paul Standridge, Terry Tostie (diabetic)

Picture of the start that we missed because of foul up in registration,
first rest stop at 20 miles,
second rest stop at 35 miles, the fisish
and raise of salute to Terry and the reward for the effort and the good
deed. A special reward came later in liquid form at Bear Republic.
Twenty eight miles into head wind, a few hills for test, over three
hours getting saddle sore-but worth it. Thanks so much to all who cared
and donated to the cause.

Facing East

facing east


dark wet clouds
drag their bloated bellies
across the distant hills

bones of a tree lay
sucked down deep in the red clay
once a forest proud

burnt stumps dot the hill
like dozens of big black bears
squatting in the sun

now lost in old growth
moss skirted tree trunks
give no direction

below, river fog
swirls caress stately firs
gentles the sunrise

first published

Klamath River Meditation

There is a trail
down through tall cedar,
down to the River.

The Sun shines
in shafts of gold
creates patterns
on the red dirt.
Light-beams glisten
and dance on the water.

I sit on a boulder
flat and gray
that lies partway
Under the water.

I feel warmth
from this rock
from the Sun
from somewhere
deep inside.

I listen . . .
the Water's voice;
speaks to me.

I feel . . .
Peace.
I am . . .
Peace.

All I see is sacred.
I am . . .
sacred.

Ha’a