Dry

Out in the field running new fence line on a July day
bright electric dry clouds wispy high
against a sky the color of a robin's egg

insects with a high dry sound
yes that's how I would describe
high and dry, rasping dry legs

dry grass makes me think of a cold dry day in January
when the snow sifting through the trees looks like little diamonds

and I breathe in your essence
the essence of eternity.

Tree

Baby Raccoons

We live in such a beautiful habitat I suspect we may be a drop off site for orphaned baby wildlife via the local Wildlife rehab.

So far this year I have seen a teeny baby porcupine I actually went up to because I thought it was a black kitten, a single baby raccoon, and now three orphaned raccoons that have discovered that the poultry grain in the goose pen is delicious.

We watched them return late afternoon across the goat pasture, through the goat pen and a small hole in the fence as if they belonged there. One even sat in the goose dish.

We could get within a few feet of them.

So we put out an extra dish of food and the dog let them know they aren't really welcome here, so hopefully they'll move downstream as they mature and stay clear of coon hunters.

All things swept sole away

All things swept sole away
This -- is immensity --

Emily Dickinson

Poppies In July

Little poppies, little hell flames,
Do you do no harm?

You flicker. I cannot touch you.
I put my hands among the flames. Nothing burns

And it exhausts me to watch you
Flickering like that, wrinkly and clear red, like the skin of a mouth.

A mouth just bloodied.
Little bloody skirts!

There are fumes I cannot touch.
Where are your opiates, your nauseous capsules?

If I could bleed, or sleep! -
If my mouth could marry a hurt like that!

Or your liquors seep to me, in this glass capsule,
Dulling and stilling.

But colorless. Colorless

Sylvia Plath