We are trying hard to belong here by collecting what we can, to remember where we’ve been.
prose
PNW
We are in the backcountry Lewis and Clark style with natives and small pox and crows the size of canoes.
Promenade in green
In some ways the body was just an instrument, one you could play on a street corner for tips. And he had more body left than mind, more body left than soul.
Song for the dragonfly
It is the first day of the dragonflies but they won’t last long if my cat has any say in the matter. They have that look of prehistoric wisdom, a proven design. All that existence compressed into just one week… Read More ›
The mountains kissed the sky
Early morning walks when the light is coming on, the sky peach and the mountains blue. A morning like this your dad calls to say he has cancer: not the kind to really worry about but still, “cancer.” He’s trying… Read More ›
Ode to Weber
I bought a new charcoal grill, the kettle kind. If I keep this one as long as I did the last I’ll be 68 when I’m done with it. Sixty-eight, dragging it to the curb. Some things you can’t salvage… Read More ›
Quilt of boar skin and bone
I lay in the driveway flat as a spatchcocked chicken with the bay doors open and the Captain Beefheart blasting. That old charcoal grill was so beat up the legs popped out when you emptied the ash. The insides were… Read More ›
Song for mid-autumn soothing
I had to turn off my notifications and head to the hills for a few hours. I was glad for the smell of wet leaves and patchwork of brown and yellow on the ground, glad for the sweat in my… Read More ›
Magic, or otherwise
I walked eight miles and didn’t see another soul. Another hundred and I’d cross the Oregon border. I got to the lake, cleared a ledge of snow off by a small stand of trees and pulled out my tent, moving fast to stake it out.
Advent of absence
We can curl up with our cats and blankets and books and reheat yesterday’s soup.
Bill Pearse 