Iron Grass

Iron tufts of hair:

drought has hardened you,

wind gently combs you.

These gray grasses, toughened by sun and drought, embody what I love about this micro-environment. The metallic blades of these grass tufts will never see green again, but they'll be here for years, simply enduring. I love the colorless, indestructible presence of these plants, which are no longer living but are nevertheless still here. They are survivors of prolonged thirst and parched air, and like many survivors, there's a profound stillness about them. I imagine that even the harsh wind slows down to touch them gently.

Scouring Season

Spring is not

the growing season

but the scouring season,

when hard winds

batter the earth to bone.

Lunar Maria

A rising moon

meets the basalt hill

at the slope of earth's memory.

The inception of the Rio Grande Rift in northern New Mexico and southern Colorado was accompanied by voluminous mafic volcanism preserved in part as erosional remnants on an intrarift horst within the current axial rift graben of the San Luis Valley.

Journal of Geophysical Research, vol. 96, no. B8: "Oligocene Basaltic Volcanism of the Northern Rio Grande Rift: San Luis Hills Colorado"; R.A. Thompson, C.M. Johnson and H.H. Mehnert; 1991.

* * * *

The basalt hills behind our house are ancient shapes, the soft aftermath of ancient volcanic activity. In the evening the hills seem to embody the earth's memory, gently sloping into darkness.

Basalt is an igneous rock, porous yet dense, the color of charcoal. The lunar maria are the basalt plains of the moon. Once believed to be seas, the mare basalts are actually vast, dark plains created by volcanic explosions.

Beach Combing in Winter

With snakes asleep

and prickly pear softened by snow

we wade into the winter desert.

One of my favorite activities in the world is a land-based version of "beach combing" -- wandering through the sparse ocean of sage, rabbitbrush and prickly pear to hunt for rocks, bones, sticks, colored glass and other bits and pieces. I once found some casino tokens that had been corroded to black slivers by the sun, and occasionally I'll come across someone's tidy graveyard of beer bottles and coffee cans. I feel safer beach combing in the winter, when the rattlesnakes are hibernating underground. The thorns of the cacti are either soft and mushy after a snow or brittle and frail after a few dry weeks, so they're not as hazardous to the feet.

This land looks like an ancient, dry lake bed . . . because that's what it is. That's la Culebra in the background, the mountain range named for its serpentine curves.

Old House

House of the absent heart:

your cracked eye

holds a memory of fire.

The Visitors

After summer winds,

their scattered belongings

transformed by winter sky

This land appeared to be uninhabited until the owners temporarily took over in the summer. Like everyone who visits the Valley for the first time, or who innocently attempts to set up house here, they weren't ready for the wind. They set up a tent for their fishing gear and cooking equipment -- the wind blew it down. They installed a plastic shed to store their things -- the wind ripped it apart. So now our visitors have given up, it seems, and have left their belongings to the vagaries of the wind.

Ever since they surrendered to the forces of nature, their stuff hasn't gone anywhere.

Sage

brittle blossoms

cling to the sage brush --

winter's pungent ghosts

Three Sisters

Three wooden sisters

recall the homebound cattle

at the death of day.

I call these wooden corral posts "the three sisters." The old posts and ruined fences out here seem to take on their own identity. Weathered by wind, silvered by sun, they have faces, knots and shoulders. At one time, cattle and sheep grazed here; before that, there were buffalo. Now there are just a lot of tumbleweeds, prickly pear, rocks and a handful of human loners who are looking after the space.

After an East Wind

patch of snow --

dropped by the East wind

her abandoned dress

When I'm out walking in the winter, I come across these little heaps of snow here and there. The snow here is usually very dry, like tiny flecks of sand. Sometimes, for no reason I can identify, a patch won't melt along with the rest of the snow cover. Spotting these patches in the distance, I've mistaken them for discarded paper, old bandages, toilet tissue and abandoned clothing. This terrain plays tricks on the mind, creating tiny mirages of civilization in an area that's all but uninhabited by humans. On the other hand, it's very common for bits of human refuse to travel for miles in a strong wind, and we'll find scraps of other lives scattered near our house.

Ice Fishing

Last dusk of the year

one fisherman on the ice

sentinel of slanting light

These photos were taken at Mountain Home Reservoir on the last afternoon of 2011. The light was warm and welcoming, but a harsh wind scudded across the ice, scraping our cheeks and necks. The tiny figure in this photo never appeared to shift positions the whole time we were there. I imagined him or her waiting patiently for hours for slumbering fish to wake from their underwater dreams.

Disappearing Roads

overgrown road

the brush has blurred you

the horizon has retaken you

now you're ready for the traveler

without a map

Our two plots of land are part of an entity known as the San Luis Valley Ranches. About 40 years ago, a real estate developer had the idea of turning this area into a subdivision. There's actually an SLV Ranches covenant, dating back to the late 1960's, that imposes various restrictions on the subdivision's homeowners. We're not allowed to live in a tipi, raise swine or start a commune out here. Although I've occasionally been intrigued by the idea of living in a tipi, I can't say I'm very interested in swine-herding or communal living.

Oh, and no houses with gray stucco. Obviously a gray stucco dwelling would clash with the aluminum or vinyl siding on the rare mobile home or RV that dots the landscape.

In fact, there are few residential structures on the Flats. The developer's dream was never realized. Apparently some of these plots have been purchased, but few people actually settled here. The winds are too fierce, the winters too cold. There's no electricity, no natural gas, and the geographical barriers imposed by the mountains tend to separate the Valley's residents from the rest of the world. As a result, the Flats are crisscrossed by dozens of roads, which are marked by hand-painted street signs. Road graders pass through the area every few weeks, but they only grade the roads that are commonly used. The roads that have no inhabitants and no steady traffic are left to grow over, returned to the rabbitbrush, prickly pear and sage.

Winter Seeds

white bursts of silk

on a hardened winter prairie

seeds for a second lifetime

I found these white tufts of silky, cotton-puff seed on a shrub the other morning. I assume this is a rabbitbrush, although it's hard to recognize it without the distinctive bracts or yellow blossoms. August through October is the flowering season for rabbitbrush. Their seeds mature in August through September.

The Flats are as dry as an empty ocean bed; the gray grasses remain fixed in their usual dormant state, wind whistling through their iron-hard blades. In some ways, this looks like a merciless terrain, but this land has given me the chance to start a new life.

Happy New Year

dawn leafs the mountains

as if the stone were paper

as I watch the sun

candle the ancient granite

the luminous pages close