Stirring the Mud

A stately ship with banners and bunting
sails the Potomac on a worried wind,
the band plays Peasant Stomp under
sweet smelling smoke and fireworks,

heron lazily fly south to black-water
swamps in Georgia, and oyster boats
give the bottom one last rake.
Banners and bunting drift across

the channel, enter shallow water
and founder on a bar. Stuck in the mud
with a heavy list, lighters haul spoils,
the captain waves to passing boats.

The captain’s launch follows the shore
up a side channel to a buggy morass.
A crackling sound comes from the keel,
and the captain serves oyster stew.

A Message from the Northern Plain

for Totally Optional Prompts

Do you remember the skinny kid
who lived at the old ranger station,
who sold newspapers to loggers
coming down the road? He remembers you,

and blossoms the southern winds bring
to your garden in this season.
The southern winds and wild geese are lost
in the clouds over Galawah pass,

and never come this early to lakes
on the northern plain. My cabin keeps
the snow out, but frost creeps in through the night.
I watch moonlight silver the frozen lakeshore

where I am destined to spend my remaining days
thinking on the profits of warfare.

Distant Sirens

for 3 Word Wednesday

Resting on the south jetty I consider
breakers coming across the bar.

Ocean swells are weather's apology
for last night's emotional outburst.

Old regrets are murky fog
rendering distant the envious sirens.

Standing in the Rain

We have an ancient proverb I learned
when I was young. It was found written
on a tavern wall, either behind
the bar or in the men’s room,

the history isn’t clear, maybe
it was written on a scrap of wall
paper found in the attic, inscribed
on the back of an old photograph

of a horse team pulling a plow
across central California,
or etched on a turtle shell.
It’s guided explorers and politicians

through mythic forests and over glaciers
of compassion. It’s been translated
to and from many languages,
encrypted, concealed in code, inscribed

on the state seal, and it goes like this:
When coyote sees the sunrise it’s better
to stand in the rain than eat a frog.
I don’t know what it means,

but it’s such a good proverb,
and it’s ancient.

Ken

Ken says my clock is wrong,
the clock doesn’t care, Ken does,
I get another clock,
it’s wrong too.

Diana

for Totally Optional Prompts

Walking to the coffee shop
to meet Diana, I haven't seen
her for months, I listen to quarters
in my pocket clink together,

they are rounding off the edges,
wearing each other out. She's there
when I arrive, I feel the memories,
hear the old truck rattle

down the gravel road, guinea hens
announce me, the screen door slams
to the river, I'm late again.
In a coffee pocket we clink together,

round off the edges,
wear each other out.

Going West

for 3 Word Wednesday

A search unravels along the rails
going west through Kalaloch farmland.

The only love is a slogan
on a worn out T-shirt.

Today is a punched ticket
and a gateway to close.

Like A River

I’m in a period of transition, moving
between the office tower and reflecting pool,
the research center and sewage pond,
the farm house and stock tank.

I’m in coyote relocation between
chickens and field mice, ranch land
and city park, summer’s lush growth
and winter’s white death. I’m between jobs,

lovers, trucks, meals, tides, the devil
and the deep blue sea. A migrating bird,
I’m after a quick meal and a way out,
I might turn up at a Buddhist temple

in Rio, or get eaten by a falcon
and pooped out in the compost,
either way I’m moving on
like a river, I won’t be back.

Stopping Time

for Writers Island

The clock is running and stubborn jobs
stand around like vultures, pecking the spirit
out of my carcass. At dusk I stop time,
put aside the pressing work and vacuum

the carpet, the dust in corners, cobwebs
behind the door, and think not
on its low priority. With time stopped
there’s no breeze at Bowerman Basin

to sway trees, water doesn’t move,
plover stand at mid-whistle, I focus
on shadow, reflection, ground fog.
With no clock I’m finally able to catch

up with Molly, track her down and stare
at her frozen motion, recall the way
she walks out of a room, think on color.
With no pressing schedule I ignore

the phone, linger over a glass of wine,
sit and ponder until my thinker’s empty.
I restart the clock, watch the moon rise,
and feel the shadows of vultures.

Montesano Caucus

for Totally Optional Prompts

An eager flock meets in a second-floor room
away from the chilly drizzle outside,
more are here than any memory, content
that someone else is getting this thing organized,

this table is 601, check the map
for your own precinct. These are the eagers
who looked at the menu for days and are ready
to stand and be counted for an issue,

a principle, for an honest face.
A month ago the eagers were like the gulls
perched on boom logs in the bay watching
excited orcas chomp salmon.

The gulls weren't invited to the table,
they watched the thrashing about not expecting
any leftovers from the first-in-the-nationers,
until the orcas lost focus

and didn't get the job done.
On the second-floor the eagers squabble
and splash, learn the taste in the first bite,
learn a craving to get a bite before the orcas.

Coyote Song

Dust devils swirl through sagebrush,
restive soil whirling in ritual dance
around a sun-baked stage,
the swirl quiets at dusk

and sifts to ground.
Coyote sings lonely in the night
to the Rabbit in the Moon,
about hungers he wants to forget.

Around a moonlit room
dark hair whirls in ritual dance.

Dry Tank

Thirty miles south of Sulfur Junction,
in a sagebrush valley between Dixie
and Gravel, a spotted lizard hides
on the dirt road, a molting windmill

creaks and clangs over a dry tank.
Home to three pronghorn, a coyote
and a mining claim, the valley watches
a hawk migrate south on a storm front,

purple and gold billowing down
from the north. Lightening flickers,
then the whole turmoil howls
and scuds down through Sand Pass.

Ed Sommers was born in Dixie,
raised in Gravel, and lies buried
at the claim. Coyote howls
in the night, the hawk will return,

Ed never left.

Stalker

for Totally Optional Prompts

In the chill of desert sunrise
a jackrabbit's alert to sagebrush shadows,
alert to a coyote in Guano Gulch.
In a one-tavern town Anna walks

among the stalls in Pioneer Market,
walks on legs long and slender,
like chopsticks picking through stir-fry.
Mushrooms, fresh broccoli, hot peppers.

Anna's alert to a shadow moving
in the recesses, a shadow keeping pace
behind crates of apples, butchered chickens,
cut flowers looking for condolences.

Anna adjusts her shopping bag and turns
down Whitney Court, chopsticks click-click
down the narrow alley between old walls,
bricked over windows, a dark stairwell.

From a sudden doorway a shadow lunges
into a rattlesnake's eager fangs,
the shadow's cast across the doorstep,
chopsticks click-click down the narrow alley.

Lower Klamath

Through marsh fog
in predawn dark,
Sandhill’s lamentive rattle
seeks distant valleys.

A lone Coyote in
Mosquito’s gray cloud
prowls the water’s edge,
ignores the setting moon.