Long Chaparral Poems

Turtle heard that Salt Woman was on the road again, and he was 
wanting a taste of her. Some miles from Cochiti, he stopped 
for directions at a Speedway gas station.
The dwarf who ran the...

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Ecotone 

I did not plant the prairie tickseed that appeared among
The cultivated flowers of my garden and quickly dominated.
It seemed to say, “We live, still!

My house sits in a tension zone, an ecological “no man’s...

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I've got me a woman, a sweet lovin' woman
So, "Why", do you ask, "am I sayin' goodbye?"
A cowboy like me, has a hankerin' to be free..
Free to be roamin' under sweet prairie skies
  ...

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Potato Mountain

I will arrive
an habitual escapee
from the rabbit warrens
of central planners

By ferreting north
in search of
breaks in the maze
rifts in the grid

I will follow
a stream beside
the climbing track
and yet higher

To a saddle below
the great ridge 
southward...

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It had been a hot and dusty week chasin' them wily steers thro' the chaparral.
And, later, sweatin, cussin' and brandin' them wild critters in the old corral!
It was Saturday night and he was headin' for...

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I am from my daddy's drunken heart, beating so fast as though flung from a 
furious circle of women who are welcoming the men back from the hunt.

I am from my mother's matted eyes. ...

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sweet pungent odor
fermented hay 
dark and warm
slithers of light spit
through the cracks of the
warped weathered wood
old pie tin lies in the dirt 
in its corner
where the mean old bull snake
drank milk with the cats
and kept...

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A properly equipped cowpoke is bound to impress the boss.
He'll need a mount of course and a silver-studded saddle fer his hoss.
He'll need some chaps to protect his jeans frum them pesky burrs,
And his outfit...

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Stalker of the Chaparral




O you wild horned beast
You stalker of the Chaparral
Your meat is wanted for the East
So, heed to the cowboy’s call.

They say a country is built
Upon the steel lines of the railroad,
And big...

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When cowboys sprawl 'round the camp fire after the days work is done,
They strum guitars and tootle harmonicas and sing to have fun.
Real cowboys don't sing Honky-Tonk or She Done Me Wrong stuff.
They leave that...

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In the palo verde and black chaparral lies,
A cross by an empty grave where no one cries.
It notes the lonely death of a man named Chance Roam—
Just a proud young cowboy that never rode home.
...

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Many many moons ago
leaving the porch
of a south-facing canyon,
I hiked to a place 
where the foothills
narrowed,

Where the asphalt road
ran astride the reservoir lake
into which kingfishers
dived at will,  
and Great Horned owls
hooted at passerby,

And crickets...

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Santa Barbara, Summer 2017

Monday
I walked on the bluffs above the sea.
Orange poppies bloom in the dunes.
I discovered
the labyrinth:
smooth stones spell the path.
Peaceful pilgrimage.

Tuesday
Walked on the beach and smelled:
Tar from the oil seeps,
fennel,
coastal sage,
eucalyptus.
And, of course,...

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Silent sage and chaparral
Gather ‘round the old corral,
Like the cowhands way back then
When the Old West did begin.

Too soon gone are all the days
Of the cowboy and his ways—
He’ll be herdin’ now no more
Like he...

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Cookie, fire-up yer chuck wagon 'cause th' round-up is begun!
Us cowpokes is gonna cull th' herd frum dawn to th' settin' sun!
We is gonna supply you wid th' cookin's fer our chuck tonight;
Heaps uv good...

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There was a day on TV
Where westerns were all the rage
You could take your pick
From your TV paper page

Together our masked hero the Lone Ranger
With Tonto kept outlaws in a spin
Have Gun Will Travel was...

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Night spills over the day like India ink from a well
bleeding into the deep crevasses of hill and dell
running into clear cold streams once shimmering, bright 
painting Prussian blue the trees on the high chaparral.

Night...

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I’ll go a ridin’ no more through blue stem or chaparral,
Just lead my horse to pastures of green.
I’ll watch those rose ruby suns ease on past the ol’ corral—
Think back on the things I’ve done...

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Tarnished gray, as  the doves you have scattered away
you were yelping as if the moon were your prey
 
Eclipsed by the sage  you then vanished from eyes
disguised by the chaparral, just as clouds...

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It Started Out With Roy Rogers
Then Moved On To John Wayne
My Family, Loved To Watch ‘Gun Smoke’,
‘The Rifleman’ and ‘Shane’ …

Mine, Were ‘The Big Valley’
‘Bonanza’ And ‘High Chaparral’
Paladin’s, ‘Have Gun Will Travel’
And ‘Rawhide’ and ‘Wagon...

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