If it
Started with an apple;
Will it
End with a syringe?

Ten thousand years to grapple
Sin-tactics on a binge

We will be the willows,
Resolving to live,
Bending with the storms,
Not the cottonwoods
Refusing change,
Standing rigid,
Breaking in the gales.

My brother is a pilot,
Not just any old pilot...
A tail dragger pilot,
Champions
Cubs,
Super Cubs.

Planes made of spars and fabric,
Held tight
By screws
And dope,
And glue.

Airframes part wood,
Part aluminum,
Part steel.

Fuel tanks sloshing in the wings
Either side above our heads,

Set the mags,
Hand crank the prop,
Turn on the fuel,
Hear her pop
And roar to life.

We strap in
Single file,
Controls fore
And aft.
And rev 'er up
To join the winds.

Once up,
He yells, "She's yours!"
And I am piloting,
Or rather gingerly sliding her
About the blue,
Skidding right or left,
Holding my breath,
Wondering how much I dare
To tip her up there in the air.

"I've got the stick!"
He yells, and I let go.
"Don't be afraid to fly it!"
"It's just a machine!"
"Make it do what you want it to do!"

And we are diving toward the ground,
Then bringing her up and tilting 'round.

"Give her fuel when you tilt to turn!"
He demonstrates, and we are standing
On the wing,
Perpendicular and looking to our left and down.


I know he's right,
That I am timid in my flight,
And he is brave with years of joy,
A pilot fearless since he was a boy.

"You want to land?"
I hear him say.

"No, that's alright!"
"Not today!"

To prove how safe it is to fly,
He touches down,
Then bounces high,
And vaults us back into the sky.

We flit across the fields,
And then,
He flies beneath the power lines,
To show how spray planes catch the ends
Of fields.

He skies the plane at either end,
Then bee lines it to the badlands' edge
Where suddenly we are swooping down
Between the canyon walls, and sinking low,
Then, rising, turning to our right,
He sails us toward sun's dying light.
My only hope is that we will land
Before the night
Erases all our sight.

And sure enough,
The air is calm.
The night is coming on.
Gusting breezes are all gone.

We gently settle once again,
Back at the ranch,
And I help wheel her, then
Into her waiting hangar pen.

Life can be lived all in a panic.
Fear fills us with a lingering dread,
But we should live our lives.

Just like my brother said.
"It's just your life, so make it do
Whatever it is you want it to!

Letting God
Be God:
Most difficult,
Yet ever wisest.

tenuous thin line
connects earth and heaven
kite pulls in the moving air
tugs to run across the sky
fights ignorantly for freedom

one thin line tethers a rebel
to here and now
to past and present
to futures connected

past connects the far reaching kite
unknowing of its need for tension
for the saving pull
grounding
maintaining
the lifting angle
into pulling air

when severed
the kite screams
joyous freedom
until
caught by wind
hurtles
          end       over      end     over      end
tail clotting
only the wind rules
direction sideways down
plummeting to crash
directionless
                                  free
               untethered
broken upon rocks
or strangle-held in trees

"Blackberry Eating"  (Galway Kinnell)
Took my redneck self to early summer,
Late June, Montana sun, and shimmering humidity
Aboard a tractor droning over fields,
Uprooting green, turning the acres brown
Atop a table rimmed in badlands.

Remembering past Junes'
Berry thickets in cool ravines,
I left the tractor idling
To cross barbed wire,
To descend into cool trees.

June berries everywhere;
Blue-black sweetness weighted branches.
I stained my face and hands with plunder,
Then plundered and filled my upturned cap.

Grazing and grasping,
The copse's edge I turned
To meet a coyote on two legs
Berry browsing.

Who yelped, and who screamed?
At the top of the bank, I turned;
My cap and berries scattered,
The coyote's tail down as he left the scene.

"As good as any," the weary traveler said,
"For us to set our burdens down, and rest our heads."
Stopped they to ease their feet along the winding road
But just a little then, and picking up their loads
They journeyed onward toward a slowly setting sun
Assuming miles stretched far ahead ere they were done.

"This place," she whispered, as she held his withered hand,
"As good as any," though not the resting they'd planned.
"You wait, while I go on ahead," her whisper sighed,
His resting place so shallow, the winding road beside.
Suns rose and set a little while slowly she trudged on,
The hazy past a trail; eternity beyond.