A Thousand Forests Razed
Many Sturdy Trees the Poet’s felled
For pages filled with nature’s awesome beauty
As though never before have they beheld
Subject so deserving of their skillful duty
January 13, 2026
’Darkness never comes on winter nights’
Darkness never comes on winter nights—
Never truly;
The snow illuminates the streets,
A midnight dawn.
January 13, 2026
Pine Needle
I found a strange pine needle once,
exploring the grove near Grandma’s home,
where my brother and I had often roamed.
January 13, 2026
Have Patience
Have patience when your noon is full,
As you peak o’er the evening fall,
When your breath quickens at the sound
Of empty valley tumbling down.
January 13, 2026
Giant Delights
Why must a field of cottontails so please,
Each stalk a thread in holy tapestry,
Whose many parts of one part in the breeze,
Much too fair for any monastery?
January 13, 2026
Two Birds by a Lake
The old Loon’s yodel, lonely flies
Across last season’s thawing lake;
Fee-bee, the Chickadee replies.
January 13, 2026
Elephantine
I don’t know much about elephants, except that they’re very large and very intelligent – intelligent enough to use about twenty-five different sounds for communication. But as little as I know, I thought I was certain about one thing: elephants are not capable of speech.
December 9, 2016
I Just Wanted to Help
It was shortly before one o’clock on Sunday afternoon. I was sipping a cold cup of coffee while reading the news on Facebook, a habit I find pleasurable despite the incessant reports of violence and corruption. The daily phantasmagoria reminds me that, while the world might be losing its way, at least my moral compass still points north. I’ve also become rather addicted to iced coffee.
August 15, 2016
My Robert is Dead!
A bus stop somewhere in Northern Utah. It’s nearly eight o’clock in the evening and the summer sun is just now realizing that it has overstayed its welcome. A woman, about fifty years old, sits on the bench, scratching her newly styled hair. It’s short, curly, and dyed the color of old blood. A man, who can’t be younger than seventy, shuffles breathlessly to the bench and lowers himself beside the woman. His knees pop audibly. In one arm, he cradles a small gift.
July 1, 2016