Sandy patches

sandy patches

where only weeds

ever grow ...

a family of deer

leaving their imprint

—kernels, Spring 2013

Maybe someday I'll be able to snap a photo around here of deer. At this time, they're still quite timid.

Autumn wind

I rarely write haiku—the tanka form seems to fit me better—but every now and then I guess I want to say a little less.

photo copyright of Robert Curtis

autumn wind

the whole earth woven

into my hair

—Lyrical Passion Poetry E-Zine, 2011

Red clay soil

red clay soil,
hardened into ceramic—
with a trowel
I attempt to chip
my way out of this drought

—August 2011

For more than a year, we were in a state of "exceptional drought." The times were strange and trying in a variety of other ways too. I remember squatting down by the ground last August and trying to chip through a small area of hardened sandy loam and clay. Eventually, things got better, though not before getting worse.

On bare ground

A poem that surfaced and survived as I tried to inch away from my writing drought:

on bare ground 
I sprinkle small seeds
with abandon
as if growing wildflowers
requires a lack of care

—Notes from the Gean, June 2011; Take Five (vol. 4), 2012

The many wildflower seeds I enthusiastically bought and sprinkled around didn't amount to much. Perhaps that's not surprising in this, what I sometimes call, godforsaken place where "nothing" will grow alongside the towering lobollies save hardy native vegetation such as yaupon and monster wild grape vines. Of course, the extensive droughts, ongoing temperature extremes, and certain other factors didn't help. 

But every now and then, when you're not really looking, a few seeds will work their magic: for me, a couple of years later, a single clump of Texas bluebonnets, the lemon-yellow blooms on Missouri primrose. . .