Yahara Winter

"Out here in the fields, few social affairs,
on backwood lanes, rarely a horse or carriage;
bright daylight, but I shut by bramble wood door,
in empty rooms rid myself of dusty thoughts."
     – T'ao Yuan-ming, "Returning to My Home in the Country, No. 2







The weary traveler today passes rickety farm fields
at 75 miles per hour his eye on the busy interstate.
The land becomes a long series of drift less hills,
shallow valleys lined by broken corn sagging.
There had been a season many years ago that I walked
thirty miles from West Salem to Sparta along the road;
the barely visible contours of the limestone bluffs
that I rush past today in such a hurry to head north,
had sunk into my hot bones, my mind became the fields.
I had stopped walking for a moment, exhausted,
not enough water, a t-shirt wrapped around my neck,
and as I sat behind the hill there was no sound of road.
The ancient whispering of the farmers was the wind
that slipped through razor thin ears of the cornstalks.
Was that hawk who, off in the distance, not visible,
shrieked to me or to absence of the abandoned field?
By the time I reached the city my legs were too tired.
Dust had gathered in the sweaty hairs of my arms.
I took the ditch growth of goldenrod as my sign
to keep moving on to the next shrinking oak savannah.

Yahara Winter

'If fame and money could last forever
the Han River would flow backward."
     – Li Po, "River Song"










Ice recedes. Ducks race overhead.
Yahara Park is a stark white field from recent snow.
Up over the bridge long-gaited neighbors
again make up a long line of passers-by
as it all melts, the sidewalks a thousand rivulets.
I watch from inside the living room,
as the white sun reaches in along the floor
as if staking new territory, warming the air,
turning the cherry wood to golden walls.
My mind returns to the canvasbacks
that crash down into the open water across the street
and a rush of excitement flies out me.
I feel the cold water below, warm air above.
The poem done, I leave all my work unfinished.
I wonder who would ever really notice.

Yahara Winter

"It may be that the hour is snow
seeming never to settle not
even to be cold now slipping..."
– W.S. Merwin










This morning I awoke
and knew I didn't have to look out the window
to see that the world
had slowed down
by the great new folded drapery
of snow
It was not a dream that there were no cars
for just this hour
and the only sound
was that imagined tinkle
of each flake
falling down silent as cut cloth
and finding its song
the flowing river
to hear again
not the bus drone but the crisp squeak
of childrens' boots as they slowly
punched down into the inches
of the sidewalk
When I walked outside
it was the trees along the river
that held their tongues
they did not speak
they did not want to
and greeted the curl of fog that lifted
up over the mouth of the Yahara River
as the old breath
of passengers who paddled across the lake
you could not see
their story and speech
disappearing

Yahara Winter

"The old snow gets up and moves its
Birds with it

The beasts hide in the knitted walls..."

– W.S. Merwin, "December Among the Vanished"








But then there always was the short drive
along riverside
where it did not matter the condition
of the old houseguests
across the street
where I knew the crows roamed the rooftops
and the old man wore his mechanics suit to shovel
because I saw
the bridges
I saw the lace like sheets of ice
bulb out out at narrows
and neighbors
young and old
hunch over the rocky crown of that bridge
and it felt a home
what are we looking for?
we have the water
a school outlets
and students come walking over
the steps
and I see
what it is for always has been

Yahara Winter

"This way the dust, that way the dust.
I listen to both sides
But I keep right on.
I remember the leaves sitting in judgement
And then winter."
– W.S. Merwin, "Air"







There is the forest of Clark County
that I pass by winding road
it is early February and a recent snow
has turned the floor of the world
to a crystal fabric, dry and light.
The woods have been recently thinned.
Old lodgepole pines stand now
without limbs or their own drawn
fabrics of green that have draped
their rising bodies for how many years.
I keep moving, but also stop and wander,
as we do with all things from car
at forty miles per hour, warm by heater,
and move in among the new briars
that circle around tall stacks of lumber
like the razor spiral fences
we see in movie war zones.
It had been the simplest of measures
for the drivers of mechanical saws to lift
that giant crane by nothing but a finger
and erased the limbs by a flick as if shaving.
The leaping squirrels and dashing whitetail
can now see a thousand yards past
those old stands of tented trees
into all the danger that was once hid.

EggZ Foodcart

"It's amazing how many people have never had a truly fresh egg. Hens that live a healthy life with fresh air, good food, and clean water (not to mention open space and green pastures) lay eggs that are firmer, more deeply colored, hater-shelled, and, most important, more nutritious than those of their factory counterparts." – from the Backyard Homestead









I assume that like most every other regular daily cook out there, over the years I have thought of my very own food cart concept. In fact, as I look back over some of my oder blogs, there had been a time the pace of food cart ideas got a little out of control, as if I were going to actually follow through it, put idea to action, buy the truck, paint it cool, then hit the street. It didn't help much that Tyler Florence's Food Network show Food Truck competition was then in full swing and the process of perfecting your niche food, vying frantically for your little parking spot somewhere on the fringes of a park usually, or maybe a tailgate-style location, looked awfully fun. On second glance, ten years later, I see that there are some pods of success for food trucks. We visited Harvard University this past last summer and they had a very nice couple of offerings right at the edge of campus, and a good two or three hand fulls of people were lined up on a nice day grabbing bahia ma sandwiches.  At the very top end of State Street in Madison, near campus, there's a very active cart economy, perfectly placed, near the U Bookstore. For myself, I always wondered if I could have opened up a egg card, cleverly called, with a 'z'! Eggz...the idea being that everything made, as our niche, would include

eggs in some way. A few nights ago I made an asparagus frittata, for example, and remembered how wonderfully adaptive and inclusive eggs can be. I basically created my pan frittata by putting into stuff I had on hand like a bottom layer of sliced then baked potatoes, some red peppers, parmesan cheese into the egg mixture, sautéed mushrooms, and finally a good ten asparagus strands across the top for beauty and green. A slight warming on the stovetop began to set the mixture, and only really 15 minutes firmed the frittata in the oven. Cut it into quarters and you truly have something potentially similar to a slice of pizza in your hands. You could churn out a ton of frittatas quickly and with any ingredients folks wanted. Why not a chili mix over the top? How's about a chipped beef inside?  All veggies you ask? Perfect. All cheese? Yes.  Eggs have, for obvious reasons, a long and varied culinary past – they can be used as the most primitive source for a meal as fried and served, or turned to a mallet over arugula drizzled with a french sauce. Virtually every food style you can think of, eggs could contribute.  My own recent 'hot style," tagine cooking, could use in virtually ever recipe a cracked egg over the top for style and texture. Think of an omelet style disk turned taco cover and holding in .... breakfast ingredients?  Egg over a soup? Absolutely. Scrambled eggs and mashed potatoes? I don't see why not? We haven't even gotten started with all of the various things that can be done for Deviled eggs. You name the favorite ingredient, dice it up small, and plug it into that perfectly ovular receptacle and there is a protein bite that offers a lot of flavor.  Our Eggz Cart would, of course, get its eggs only from the most local sources. It could offer morning noon and night. Watch out for the passing egg truck coming to your neighborhood soon!

Yahara Winter

"Autumn rains ending in this river town,
and wine gone, your lone sail soars away."
  – Li Po, "Fairwell to a Visitor Returning East"










Mild temperatures we walk the ice,
thin snow covers hundreds of fishing holes.

Yesterday forty small shacks stood
as if the skyline of a city block.

We follow eagle tracks from where it landed
as if from nowhere and smothered a sunfish

then walked off near shore to open water
where the talon marks just disappeared.

Today the sun has slid behind the curtain
again and fishing holes like mirrors abandoned.