Saturday, December 31, 2011

New Year's Eve Brunch

The last drop of tea amber globed
quavers 
on the red rose teapot’s spout
drops 
nestles 
into the creamy cupful
hesitates
surrenders
to the new reality.

Tuesday, December 6, 2011

Opportunistic

White plastic shopping bag
ballooning against the frosty 
roadside weed stalks.
Just the thing!
Along the lane it fills -
flattened soda cans
ragged paper plates
tangled baling twine
a broken green Frisbee.

Thursday, December 1, 2011

The Only Thing Not Frozen Out Here

Amber liquid in the shoulder 
of the whisky bottle sprawled 
face down in the fence line.

Wednesday, November 30, 2011

November's End

Gray gauze tangles in tree tops 
on the valley bottom I swim through
almost-droplets air.

Tuesday, November 29, 2011

Overcast

Gray ice vapor lid 
clamped all round 
the rim of this earth bowl
sun is a nickel of iridescence
low in the southeast.

Monday, November 28, 2011

Walking

tup - hard boot heel landing
sqwiiiitch - forefoot rotating on wet gravel
tup...sqwiiitch, tup...sqwiiitch
tup...sqwiiitch, tup...sqwiiitch
and while one foot is tup...sqwiiitch-ing
the other foot and leg swing, swing
forward and... down, tup...sqwiiitch
remember to breath, no - breeeath!
remember to let the arms swing
tup...sqwiiitch, tup...sqwiiitch, tup...sqwiiitch, tup...sqwiiitch


Thursday, November 17, 2011

Tuesday, November 15, 2011

Snuggle

Black kitten’s weight in my left hand
rumble against my ribcage
angora softness - his head 
tucked under my chin.
Purring fades, head drops -
sleeping kitten is no easier to put down.

Monday, November 14, 2011

Layers Before the Sun

Skating above the ridge
swift pearl gray cloud rags
high beyond, still, ominous
steel gray cumulous.

Wednesday, November 9, 2011

Except

An hour ago the sun 
rolled over the ridge
melting frosted fields
except 
downbeam of the  ponderosa
where every amber stalk
stands crystal cased.

Friday, October 14, 2011

Mosaic

Angular gray stones 
mortared in the puddle basin 
with drying sepia mud.

Wednesday, October 12, 2011

Saturday, October 8, 2011

Autumn Onset

The season’s turned 
a cool wet corner,
across the pasture 
the aspen grove 
is starting to rust.

Friday, October 7, 2011

Mid-Morning Cuppa

Lift the round bowled yellow mug
down from the high sink shelf.
Reach four more times piling 
graduated brown powders
into the white ceramic interior -
light cocoa, yellow brown maca
umber lumps of instant decafe
bare sprinkle of terra cotta chipotle.
Now the steaming kettle and the 
spinning spoon.  Now the first sip.

Tuesday, September 27, 2011

Rain Song

Morning mizzle kisses the umbrella silently
our boots crunch...crunch...crunch lane gravel
a pine we pass beneath interjects a riff of
fat drum drops plop plopping on taunt nylon.

Monday, September 26, 2011

A Prosperous Year for Daddy Longlegs

A brand new six story prey cafe
has sprung up overnight in my
dining room’s southeast corner,
the patient proprietor waiting inverted
beneath the third floor parlor scattered 
with crumbs of previous patrons.

Tuesday, September 20, 2011

Draining Pickles

Thin dill slices, bits of garlic and
black peppercorns swirl clockwise
below the dripping plastic fork.

Saturday, September 10, 2011

September Hawthorn

Amongst the inch long thorns
California quail tchuck and forage 
black wrinkled berry like fruits -
brown seeds in a pea sized skin 
of slightly sweet fruit leather.

Thursday, September 8, 2011

Where Ginger Tea Tingles

Back middle on top of tongue
along edge and tip of tongue
roof of mouth at the rear
opening of the throat all round.

Saturday, August 27, 2011

Poppy Seed


Snip, snip, just below
the pale brown globes 
place them in the pail 
dangling from my arm -
I’ve harvested a half gallon 
of miniature maracas! 

Friday, August 26, 2011

Micro-Jungle

Self seeded cosmos grows thick,
towering along the lawn edge,
canopy scatter crowned
with white, with orchid pink 
palm sized radial blossoms,
understory thick with side stalks
branching at ferny forty-fives.
On the shaded soil floor domestic
tabbies dream of forest primeval.

Thursday, August 25, 2011

The day Begins to Cool at Last

After the sun disappears 
behind the shielding ridge
walking to the mailbox reveals
a map of micro-climates -
cooling across the open pasture  
cooler among the aspens creekside
warm under the sweet ponderosa.

Wednesday, August 24, 2011

Green Grapes

Bursting firm warm globes
sweetly mild - except 
for occasional small squint
inducing tart ones!

Tuesday, August 23, 2011

In the Dishpan

A raft of bubbles moored alongside
a red Seattle’s Best Coffee mug
reclining half submerged atop
a sunken stack of yellow plates.

Monday, August 22, 2011

Whose Livery?

Unmistakably a ladybird beetle
but it bears a creamy yellow elytra
not the common crimson and
black horizontal bars replace
the standard issue buttons.

elytra: wing case

Saturday, August 20, 2011

Blanched


Holding the peach in my hand
fingers broad spread
slowly closing my grasp
the fuzzy jacket slips off
revealing glimmery slick
yellow orange red succulence.

Friday, August 19, 2011

Nightlight

Sneaking under the closed blind
a splash of moonlight
reflecting on the glass desktop.

Wednesday, August 17, 2011

Chocolate Chip Oatmeal Cookie


Hot sweet nutty fragrance,
soft insides spotted with gooey
brown goodness stretching 
between broken halves,
crisp crunchy bottom crust.

Tuesday, August 16, 2011

Avian Propwash


Purple petunias flailing
like a trailing scarf
evidence the turbulence of
hummingbird’s hover.

Monday, August 15, 2011

Night Feedings


Yet again the kitten wakes me
after a couple short hour’s sleep,
when his tiny belly is eye-droppered full
we sit on the floor in the first sunlight.

Sunday, August 14, 2011

Mona Lisa 1:1 Reproduction


Over and over, your serene bemused face
but never have I noticed the mountains
sea, roadways and arching bridge!


(Viewed at The Northwest Museum of Arts and Culture, Spokane, Washington, USA as part of the Leonardo DaVinci - Man, Inventor, Genius exhibit.)

Friday, August 12, 2011

Breadseed Poppy


Atop the silver green seedpod globe
grows an amber lined compass rose,
a crimson and black lady bird beetle
rests in the center plotting it’s course. 

Thursday, August 11, 2011

Yellow

Honey bee working, one after the other,
tiny florets in the brown sunflower face, 
all her foreparts caked in brilliant pollen 
quoting the color of the showy outer rays.

Wednesday, August 10, 2011

Sun's Up

The scrabbling outside the window is Sunrise,
she's hanging amid the scarlet runner bean's
orange blossoms halfway up the trellis,
a scolding hummingbird just out of reach.

(Sunrise: a year old tabby cat)


Tuesday, August 9, 2011

Rinse

Sunlight and hot water fall together
bubbling onto dandelion yellow plates
stacked in the old white ceramic sink.

Sunday, August 7, 2011

Highland Games Pipe Band Competition

Three smartly kilted pipers 
from the head of the column
marches an enthusiastic drummer
with a most un-martial bounce.

Thursday, August 4, 2011

Dots

Drying elderberry florets
scattered like creamy confetti
over green hammock stripes.

Wednesday, August 3, 2011

Loosen Up

Orange daylily quick sketched 
on the edge of a paper
where it doesn’t matter 
touched up with colored pencil.
Hey - not bad!

Tuesday, August 2, 2011

Monday, August 1, 2011

Writing at Nightfall

Eyes lift from typing,
the window sneers blackly. 
Lower the shade - stop the night
from swallowing my words!

Saturday, July 30, 2011

Popular Poppies

A dozen breadseed poppies
blossoms pink and lavender
amid the blue green foliage and 
bumpy round unripe seedpods.
At the center of each blossom 
a fat chartreuse button
wears an Elizabethan ruff of 
creamy stamens buzzing
with two or three, or even four, 
golden honey bees per flower.

Friday, July 29, 2011

View from the Hammock

Clouds of elderberry blossoms,
creamy sun splashed tops
lemony shadowed undersides,
against bright cerulean sky.

Thursday, July 28, 2011

Khon

Orange day lilies arc 
like traditional Thai dancers
before purple robed petunia courtiers.

Wednesday, July 27, 2011

Plan Bee

“Oh!  There is a bumblebee on the floor!”
She slides it onto a plastic gift card,
and covers it with a juice glass.
Six legs wave weakly in the air,
she tips the glass, tumbles the bee upright,
it lists sideways, a foreleg raised wardingly
and buzzes feebly, one wing barely moving.
“I wonder if the cats got it.
Should I just put it out of it’s misery?”
“Can you?   I couldn’t.”
“I’ll just take it outside.”
“Wait.”  I squeeze out a glob of honey. 
The bee is oblivious with exhaustion.
She maneuvers it to face the amber bump - 
a long proboscis lunges into the sweetness, 
frantically pumps up the ready nourishment.
We gather round exclaiming, peering, 
running for magnifiers (which don’t help much)
and then she takes the bee in it’s prison
to the picnic table and sets the glass aside.
An hour later, there is only the sticky card.

Tuesday, July 26, 2011

The Other Side of the Fence

The white blanket appaloosa stallion
stands at the fence nearest the green pasture
where the mares and foals graze amid daisies.
His head droops, tail swishes periodically,
eventually he turns and plods to the far 
corner of the trammeled bare corral. 

Friday, July 22, 2011

Cool Summer Greenhouse

A mossy archipelago is emerging
on the sepia sea of dirt floor
islands of bright apple green bounded
along their fjorded coastlines
by graduations of olive and marine.

Thursday, July 21, 2011

Eggsperimenting

Teaching the ten year old 
to separate eggs 
we decided to experiment with 
the spaghetti server.
It is a failure - 
the yolk is safely cupped 
while the glistening white 
hangs grotesquely from the holes 
and metal fingers but 
never lets go -
he fizzes with laughter, 
“It looks so cool!”

Wednesday, July 20, 2011

Honey Hero

The plastic bear is up to his neck again 
in dark amber sweet viscosity.
He wears his pointed blue cap smartly
but hunches noticeably to the left
his right shoulder and ear lobe gone
lost in a microwave incident,
and he leans unnaturally far forward 
his feet shrunken toward his belly
from simmering angled in hot water,
honorable scars received in the line of duty
in the War on Crystallization.


Tuesday, July 19, 2011

Monday, July 18, 2011

Ripping out pigweed, johnny-jump-up, dandelion,
spiders and beetles scurry every direction -
this is their rainforest I’m devastating.

Sunday, July 17, 2011

Saturday, July 16, 2011

Cooling ginger tea tingles 
along the side edges, 
on the bottom tip of my tongue.

Friday, July 15, 2011

Midnight on the Porch

Among the purring shadows
two tiny dark spots waddle - 
Apples has brought her kittens! 

Thursday, July 14, 2011

Another Rescue

All night the rain pattered whispering,
weighting the foliage like snowfall
flattening tall grasses in herringbone 
bending lilac boughs to kiss the ground.
Young son ventures through the drops half-clad
to save the towering foxgloves spires
gently shaking each precious stalk
releasing a fresh and horizontal shower.

Wednesday, July 13, 2011

Summer Rain

Air ion fragrant, garden laden, forest kissed
cool-warm drops blessing face, hands, bare toes.
Hallelujah for the pillow and book on the swing
that the leaf pattering dared me to rescue!

Tuesday, July 12, 2011

Ladybird Mystery

Translucent amber dotted in black
the convex teardrop carapace 
lies abandoned on cool tile.

Monday, July 11, 2011

Saturday, July 9, 2011

Oak Table Still Life

Broad daisies and airy buttercups
carried up from the creekside pasture,
their stems thrust into a canning jar,
nod above a yellow soup plate
mounded with bright red cherries.