"Sunday morning,
only one place serving breakfast
in Colusa, old river and tractor men
sipping milky coffee." – Snyder, from "River in the Valley"







Go off in my own patch of the Evjue Pines
can still hear the belt line
the long steady winding highway
directly at the edge of the woods clunk and clatter
  no meaning just sound
bend down to my knees into Garlic Mustard
the entire floor green, leafed, waxy
old tendrils of Bittersweet under fallen oak limbs
looks like a new kind of snake
peaking out by coils
and I begin to lop at the Buckthorn like a mower.
Two hundred years ago
what the farm wife was doing right here,
what she did all day with mud
scraped on her legs for relief from mosquitos,
but gather kindling for another fire.
Blue jay out there a handful of blue cloth
or a rag tossed up in the leaves
then falls a little then wafts back up
to wherever it chooses.
Bluejays always had it right – still waiting for us.