DRY CRIK Journal

Red sawdust on new, blue denim
cuffs powdered by four old men that
no longer must endure another season

of new green circumnavigating gray-
faded limbs laid down, brittle fingers
dug into the grass. Black cows and calves

have given-up and gone before a month
of manzanita heat is cut, crimson
ends exposed to the living again.

Brush piled neat on stumps for quail
would please a gardener somewhere
out there – as good a possibility as any –

or more good feed but fewer ferns
that the old men caged and shaded.
Tonight’s dew will erase my track

on tomorrow’s grass, damp sawdust
will bleed upon a few green blades,
come morning. Half-a-cord to mix

with oak, a gift – small luxury
reviving embers back to life as flames,
chunk of limb to hold the coals by day.