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An apparent surprise to local weathermen, nearly two tenths rain fell on thirsty ground last night, enough to revitalize our south slope fillaree, I think, certainly enough to buy more time for the rest of our grass until the real storms arrive. Current forecast: clearing skies - today should be beautiful.
from all of us on Dry Creek!!
…as in the night when there is no moon
I must have known it once
- Robert Mezey (“I Am Beginning to Hear”)
Or rusty bucket leaking starlight upside down,
pinholes to the lasting sun near heaven once
high in the granite where chilly air turns crystalline –
we were but boys, young mountain men
around a fire. But even then, I must have known
beneath that thin thimble of the old ones, must have
overheard their voices when I faced blue tongues
upon the coals. Tamarack, bold tamarack, ever
listening from the rock beneath the snows.
One is playing upon the lute, another braiding
rivers into a knot, making small talk in our dreams
and then remembers to lift the lid near dawn again –
bell mare restless in the cold. I must have known it
then, and now confined by time, awake into black space
for the familiar voices, sweet idle chatter leaking in.
Chilly, low clouds cling along the foothills the past two mornings after the rain event that never materialized, less than two-tenths in the past six weeks after our first storm of the season, mid-October. Our higher country above 1,000 feet is holding remarkably well in the old feed, more residue than usual held over as a result of lighter stocking last season in response to the high hay prices the season before. And so it goes.
October’s two inches soaked well into the granite, and with above normal temperatures the grass took off in the protection of the old feed, temperatures apparently warm enough to give the new feed strength, judging by the condition of the cows with calves and the amount that they are currently milking. We want to get started branding, but prefer to wait until after a good rain and a promise of feed to insure that the calves heal-up quickly.
It’s been a unique and unusual beginning to our grass season, trending dry again after three below average years of pumping stockwater all summer. Though in many respects, agriculture on the Valley floor is harder hit than we’ve been, continuously punching deeper wells into a declining aquifer. One can’t help but wonder whether the future of the San Joaquin Valley, once (and perhaps it still is) the richest agricultural region in the world, will be dedicated to housing people or raising food, both hardy consumers of water.
I think it is apparent that the federal flood control projects on nearly every river feeding the Valley, implemented half-century ago, may have also diminished the amount and rate of recharge to the aquifer. Certainly the demand for water by municipalities is greater, and by environmental interests as surface water has been diverted to the Sacramento Delta. Towns like Mendota languish with the unemployed as thousands of acres (of relatively marginal ground) on the West side of the Valley lie fallow.
Many theorize that our water table, certainly mid-Valley, is influenced by Tulare Lake, once the largest body of fresh water in the United States. I recommend “King of California” by Mark Arax and Rick Wartzman for an interesting and detailed perspective of the times and circumstances that came together to influence changes to our Central Valley resources and landscapes.
Meanwhile back at the ranch, we cut firewood and wait for a rain – all seems normal.
Dear Hal, the world’s gone crazy now –
but we’re paying the poor a little more
to go to wars in far-off places. We were right
to shut the campus down. You lost it then,
slipped off into that nether realm of a
nervous breakdown, we used to call it.
‘Make life rich,’ you told us students.
Whatever happened to the kid in fringe,
wore that leather jacket everywhere, pretended
he was going to ride Traveler around
the Coliseum grid iron? And quiet Ken,
the handsome guy who wrote poetry
you busted for smoking dope before class,
admonished for the broken trust among us?
How ‘bout the Israeli captain Uri, late
twenties stiff and impatient with our naïveté,
can you see him, where’s he living now?
And the brunette with full hips and lips,
her passion unsuccessfully repressed, even
in class daydreaming in your craggy face,
your dark Jewish eyes, remember that?
You came to visit twice. Sent back photographs
of children’s colored shoes in a line at the door –
and when I lived alone we drove the ranch,
you totaling species to yourself until a
nighthawk caught in our headlights. You were
closer to God then, old testament prophet
betrayed by the religion of business.
How many years has it been since you left
Nancy alone – how she tried to hold you
together – damn near twenty now, I’d guess.
We kept in touch for a little while,
exchanging cards until our minds got full
of more pressing stuff, more places
to exist where we could make it rich.
for Harold S. Spear
In the background, the weathermen
have been waffling for a week,
clouds sailing north, early green
gone gray, red to purple fillaree
crisp the clay south slopes – needing
a drink, my father used to say.
A crescendo, a growing grumble
normal along the foothills between
rains, old men remembering
years in my mind: thirty-nine
and forty-seven – and seventy-seven
we somehow survived.
We are the oak trees and the grass,
we are the hillsides almost
always waiting for a rain.
You know everything, now – every measure
of my consumption, recorded and sorted, up for sale.
Nothing private left to mull alone – no dreams
without an extra cast of marksmen – potshots
from the gray periphery of open space, a shrinking
gauntlet near the finish line, and the safety
of dark death, my last hope for privacy.
Is this how you drive the cattle crazy, into
a feeding frenzy craving more before the knife?
These new cowboys, loud young bucks
ready to make their mark and wave the flag
for barbed wire, railroads and prosperity.
It could as well be acorns arranged,
sorted and stored for winter – brittle
manzanita in the corner, anxious oak
under eve. We could as well be gophers
or woodpeckers anticipating cold or wet,
or both in this canyon that supported
three hundred humans, I’m told. In the air,
even the forgotten are making preparations,
busy leaping beams of horizontal light
burning at its edges like a grass fire.
Fall has come dressed like spring, teasing
suspiciously, vibrantly upon the green –
it is tempting to let old eyes go, follow her
off into the shadow of something new,
dark and grand that surely looms ahead.
Or it could be time has slowed the limbs
to seek simplicity, search each step – a
time to look beyond the maze of memory
and breathe, accept – ready the senses
to let instincts play with fresh words, the
honest and untrained upon our tongues.
Nearly a week after the fact, I recognize a feeling akin to my first poetry gathering in Elko in 1989, a sense of connectedness with other creative people, all grounded to the land, to our Kaweah River watershed. Not unlike the security of my fellow cowboy poets and songwriters, it has been reassuring to be part of this local event, to be among such dynamic and diverse presenters: real hope for creative thinking and the future of our sustainable landscapes. On a personal level, I felt that part of our function was to encourage artistic expression locally, and I think we have. Subsequently, this KLAF event will grow in years to come.
I find the timing of this first festival serendipitous with our current hard economic times, times when people look to more lasting values in a rural area where the self-sufficient gene is still carried among many of us. I’m sure others across the West have noticed a similar shift in attitudes with more friendly and pleasant interactions – in tough times, a common bond and a wonderful place to express yourself from. I’ve been energized.
The event, however, has very little to do with me, except that I think this feeling was shared and conveyed to most all of those attending the various KLAF venues. The genie’s out of the jar Niki, Matt, John and SRT – and what better way to conserve the land than increasing people’s awareness of its functions and ever-changing beauty!
Initially envisioned by Matthew Rangel and John Spivey, the 1st Kaweah Land and Arts Festival is history – noteworthy history for the watershed. With standing room only at Matthew’s exhibit of prints, a transect – Due East at Arts Visalia Friday evening, I’m glad we went early to follow Matthew’s walking perspective from his childhood home in Dinuba to the Great Western Divide. Some of his unique prints included audio interviews with landowners whose foothill ranches he needed to cross to get to Sequoia National Forest and Park, conversations with generational mountain stalwarts like Art Tarbell, Forrey Cooper and Tim Loverin. Our first time in Kevin Bowman’s gallery, we’ll be back to enjoy this exhibit again before it ends on November 27th.
With two makeshift stages at the Kaweah Oaks Preserve east of Visalia, rows of artist’s booths, guided nature walks, children activities, it was festive Saturday. I couldn’t see it all, but painter/farmer Paul Buxman’s impassioned presentation was entertaining and inspirational, ambrosia for the heart and mind. Sylvia Ross’ poetry touched deeply from the earth and native culture, an enviable simple and direct line full of meaning and feeling. All framed within Park naturalist Bill Tweed’s analytical yet ‘big picture’ perspective to the distant beat of performance poet Tim Hernandez’s band, it was a diverse offering from artists of every stripe, spontaneous stuff going on everywhere.
Saturday evening’s symposium at College of Sequoia’s began with Rob Hansen’s mapped presentation of a century and a half of changes to the watershed, followed by persentations from other participants to cap an encouragingly thought-provoking event. Special recognition goes to all the local sponsors, and especially to Niki Woodard (the ramrod), Frances Tweed, Laura Childers with the help of the many youthful and busy members of the Sequoia Riverlands Trust that made it come together so seamlessly. See ‘information’ posted below Matthew Rangle’s print in the last post for more details of what took place. It really was spectacular and invigorating - real hope for the area - as next year's plans already run rampant in everyone's mind.
photo by Bev (used w/out permission)
Information: http://www.sequoiariverlands.org
October 28, 2009
Robbin & I delivered a trough to the Black property we lease that lies in the middle of the Paregien Ranch. We also wanted to see Bob’s second and third-calf heifers on the West side. Caught a distant, late evening buck and doe on Top, and some does at the head of Ridenour. Grass in our lower country could use a rain.
Each step deliberate, if not delicate, the time –
I trust it was not wasted on dreams alone,
sweet butterfly, that you felt a fleeting glimpse
of grace move closer to your soul. How you must
envy deer, now. Was it the chase? The Challenge
butter buck, manzanita-headed, your neck thick
with testosterone, or could you smell him over the next
rise, taste his liver first? It does not matter now.
Buck’s bunkhouse for old cowboys, one of those
self-sufficient, Texas oil well spreads with a few
horned cows and gentle horses, tack room full of bits
and stories and a few young men come round to visit –
not some bed, not four white walls and a hospital gown.
Better a shade tree for old bulls to predict the weather,
play dominos and watch the landscape haze away.
The old horse wants to go, watches each knee buckle
to read direction – knows it, feels it, wants it just enough
to glide across the ground. See some country. See some cows.
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