Nathan Arizona

Sad Thing Happened Today

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Today, My brother, my cousin and I were coming back across a very remote area on the Arizona Strip on our way back from Toroweap, of the Grand Canyon. That is where we had been camping. You have to traverse 64 miles of Primitive dirt road to reach this part of the canyon, and we had some bad luck while heading home. My cousin took his truck because it offered 4-wheel drive, but his tire went flat because of a tear. We had some help from a stranger, and that was a lucky thing. We thanked him. After an hour …

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Rat Race of Modern Life

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The sky burned into ashes, leaving the vista shady and tender for my barren eyes to absorb. I’ve dodged the city. What a catchy place! Even on the nighttime highway, and in my rearview mirror; someone’s headlights felt unsettling? This whole week, the tiny spurs of reality have been stabbing at my heart. Then, a brief moment on a rain swept desert was curing all the misery? Please disqualify me from rat race of modern life.

Short-lived

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The land has been swept by winter and summer. It’s tough and faded. It’ll outlast any human era. I once passed an old graveyard, and saw the eroding tombstones. Each individual had dreams, a pumping heart, and a smile. The land will outlive the foolishness of lonely humans.

Ditching the Square House

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This morning, my bag was finally packed after inserting instant mash potatoes and Top Ramon. My cook’n pot is tight ‘n secure. My car is full of gasoline with blankets in the trunk. I’m prepared for the boonies, and now I’m feeling reckless, and something is waiting. God, please, I’m leery of this formidable square house telling me how to behave and how to live. The TV is a non-stop chatter box. Society keeps rambling on… Everything has a purpose, but your face is in nature, it heals my silliness. Pity me for feeling more reclusive every hour. Damn! I …

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Cornstalks

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Rattle in the wind like bones soft and brittle, the corn isn’t ready. The wind loves your fields of dead awful silence. What creeps in your shade? Cornstalks are friends, they laugh, and they cling to Mother Earth, graciously. I sing to you, from a hammock nearby. Just listening to your Leaves. The corn babies are wrapped up in their cocoons, still developing.

Give Me An Escape

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I picture myself somewhere in a sandstone canyon on the Colorado Plateau; a deep gully in the belly of Mother Earth. Rock walls tower hundreds of feet above my head. Looking up into a narrow sky, I see clouds drift slowly in the heavens. But really, I’m actually typing a message on the internet. There is tremendous pressure to disappear into the boonies, beyond the reaches of my home town. A reckless wisdom taunts my footsteps, speaking to me in windy whispers. The trees have eyes looking at me. Listen to the forests howling in distant mountains. Giant Ponderosas filter …

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The Cottontail

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Rocks cry under clouds pouring endless sweat on green grass that dies slow in autumn. The rabbit’s life grows cold and meets a fiery end. Young was the sky that stood bold. Shadows again hunt the black leafless night. The sweetness is no more. Here comes he an animal ghost laughing between two unexplainable worlds. It is quick with movement to steal air carrying a joke that a jester couldn’t give. The mystical trees paint the coyote’s soul over a white canvas. He answers quickly to the injured rabbit’s eerie squeals swiftly ending his struggle and pain caused by the …

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The Dreamer

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the mornings here on the desert are still, long, and eternal why is the landscape so barren, and beautiful? stories burn like the never ending past I usually come here story hour when Earth recites her tales just before night when the heat sings sweet I have found no common place because my dream belongs to this sea of rocks, stones, and bushes; endless walls of grabbing beauty and pictures painted on golden faces when I die in my country bed the sleeping hills bury me under their desert trees one day walking across this endless void will be peace …

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Shadows

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Shadows creep behind images. Unusual feelings manifest themselves in the strange day. A timbered forest is where black ghost creatures lose themselves in bushes. A sound is made here and then there. The spook is a jestful trickster. Many things speak up from the floor of the ancient earth. It is how the wild animals of this forest find peace to survive. It crawls upon your skin, walks upon your feet. It dangles from wrinkled trees. They have eyes staring at you from nearby. Maybe it is an unknown beast about to jump from the brush!

Hypocritical Dude

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I enter the abominable church doors of a mall while listening to elevator music echoing down hallways of painted diversity, of various stores. Maybe I’ll go window-shop and purchase a book? I stroll around with money in my pocket, supporting the system that I may despise? The establishment cuddles my sweet tooth for french fries and pizza. Afterwards a movie fills a spot on a lazy afternoon, a horror flick fresh after a hearty meal. Feeling superficial in my heart, I wonder why I am plugged into this worldly infest of salad bars, and restaurants; and a town full of …

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Through the Window

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The morning light peered through that dirty window. The dawn was dark blue. The gusts of night were settling down. Robins nestled in trees and sung in choruses. My feelings were bewildered. My brain was recovering from yesterdays unsettling world of chaos: News flashing, history popping, and radios screaming. They all had the unique affect of creating a rambunctious fury. Where the mountain sits waiting, the white painted aspens rattle their leaves; something grows uneasy? Here in a dark bedroom, unsettled thoughts march down the main-streets of my subconscious, into halls of my conscious. They refuse to leave, and are …

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Desert Frying Pan

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The redrock sea still simmers shortly after dusk. During daytime hours, it was a frying pan sizzling beneath traveling blue clouds. Even green shady trees couldn’t yield to that massive fireball in heaven! This world of crimson light hums with desert heat. Secrets shroud themselves in realms of deep starry night, after father sun drifts beyond western horizons. Listen to those humble hoots of a wasteland owl that sings from cottonwoods. Many creatures hunt skillfully in darkness. To all furry little rodents, beware! That great winged beast haunts the midnight air.

Great Horizon

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He raises his arms to the black sky untamed knowing of an endless escape, of making voyages to limitless places, where the clouds form dark castles. The gentle rains touch the weary land with a sparkling shimmer, like stars at night. These vistas weave a web in his mind, entrenching themselves permanently. Forever, let him travel where eagles beat their wings upon air and plane the sky so free. This Journey tonight is a different world beyond the Sun’s horizon, where heaven and Earth meet. Oh how this heart sings!

Landscapes of Isolation

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There are strange feelings in my bosom, singing in my cranium. They roar like thunder in summer. These dreams love beauty. They stand defiant against those that harm Mother Earth. For the land never stops calling my spirit. Those Pinion foothills call my name, and even spacious landscapes of isolation. Those mountains laugh and sing like coyotes, but they protect this loneliness. I am free from the cage of society, free from chains. I throw away those consumerist woes. I can feel Earth Mother once again, and feel her beautiful dream, even on darkened nights. The spring season draws nearer. …

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Canyon Country Western Arts

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I am not satisfied with the current design for this weblog, so I am going to change things around a bit. It was supposed to be an experiment, but I’ve become greatly attached to this. I haven’t quite figured out how to use it? There is two other places that I do some serious writing; my personal hardback journal, and my notepad where poems are born. The blog is more informal, but highly personal? This morning, I’m just waiting on some clothes in the dryer, and then I’m headed to the Canyon Country Western Arts Festival which is just a …

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The Dead Coyote

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I pulled my car up to a post marker off the side of the highway, and there hung a dead coyote. Its head was tied to the post with bailing wire His face was covered in blood and his glassy eyes were still open staring at the broken sky. its tongue was hanging out and drizzling. I feel anger and sorrow for this murdered creature. I wanted to untie his body and bury his soul somewhere remote. a secret place where he could rest. The coyote, a friend, but they stuck him on display wasting his life away. They cut …

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The Thing With A Personality

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There’s a feeling deep inside every human being, a tiny suspicion about something that lurks around in reality. It cannot be seen nor heard, because it hides itself. It can visit you with it’s clues! It’s the abnormal shadow in the green trees. It is in those abandoned hills, and in the darkness of an attic. It loves the moonlit night with an eerie presence. It loves to hide at the bottoms of the ocean like the white whale that killed Captain Ahab. It is in Grandma’s old cellar. You can feel it while looking at a crystal waterfall, or …

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There’s An Owl In My Tree

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Avoiding the coyotes and the other things that creep and crawl upon the skin, in the darkness of the earth, he follows the whispers from the mountains. He follows them to the source. He sits there with the rain falling into his hand from the black sky above and cups it carefully, staring into the liquid. His crystal eye is full of passion for the Creative Powers. Where the old trees stand strong and the sandstone is red, he hides in the shadows. Where his bare feet wonder those ageless stone lands, silence bears full witness. This boy travels the …

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The Bear – A True Story

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Today I sleep away in this slumber and awoke to a footstep and then another My campfire was still smoking. The morning light was close but an not quite. The blue haze of the night lurked around my tent. The wind dashed through the trees. Then the clouds under the moonlight slid silently over the mountains. All alone, I had wandered across this countryside, and then rested away in my camp. The fire burned, and danced through the night. I made it very big to keep me from fright. This was a deep cemetery of trees! Very old they were! …

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Knowledge of Trees

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Every now and then, there is a strange silence on that mountain that finds its own way into our little town. Mysterious animals shroud themselves in the forests up there, beneath the cloud scraped skies. Alone and dirty on quiet afternoons, I like to leave the town on foot entering into those trees on the mountain’s edge. The great forest always knows when I am coming. I climb to a hill just below the mountain and sit down on top of it to take a break, letting a little sunshine bathe me. Ever since I was a kid, I’m used …

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Life is Forever a Mystery!

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Summer is near. Hopefully the clouds will come and bring rain upon the Colorado Plateau and Great Basin. These two enormous and uncanny deserts are my church, where untouched secrets still lurk; where wild creatures roam unscathed. There is good and evil in this little conundrum of life, but everything serves a purpose. Our reality cannot be understood with any theory. Humans can try, but I don’t think they will ever succeed in defining our infinite existence. Science and math cannot describe the beauty of a thunderstorm roaring across the land, becuase it can’t describe how I feel inside. For …

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Trying to Understand My Existence

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There is a reason I write about the desert, and other places of beauty. When I’m out in the middle of nowhere; far from cities, institutions, or establishments, It feels awesome and secure. So I’ve come to the conclusion that humans are in a deep load of shit. They keep manifesting their oppression in different ways. If I write about the wilderness, it keeps me balanced. The images of mountains, trees, and wind, these beautiful dreams are painted to my memory, and they bring understanding. I hear the wind when I feel confined, or wherever oppression pervades. Society is everywhere, …

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My Affinity For Trees

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When I photograph the landscape, the trees are the most profound models. Their twisted shapes tease my spiritual universe, manifesting great feelings to my heart. When I see the shapes of trees, and stand in their shadows, and touch the bark of slithering branches, I respect the intelligence and kindness that whispers softly from those fleshy-wooden centers. They seem to communicate with compassion. They love life in unconditional ways; great peacemakers in a hardened, troubled world; patient creatures, with the greatest definition of understanding. I?ve wanted to emulate their calmness, but I envy their beauty. Cemented in one place, they …

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Another Desert Dream

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The thunder and wind are acting strange this evening. The crickets are serenading. I’m standing there are the mesa edge watching the sun scatter its rays through gaps in the clouds. The desert becomes glowing red, and the rain sparkles through the sun’s rays, soaking the monstrous cottonwoods below, bathing them in a deep yellow light. All is quiet, except the wind, thunder, birds, and crickets. I watch the lightning strike the desert back and forth in the mystery of the moment, randomly hurling itself out of dark thunderheads that engulf the desert in shadow. These canyons are my home, …

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When Close Friends Fade Away

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It’s real funny, but I thought some friends could last forever, that they would always be someone you could lean on? But even close friends come and go. They soon fade from your life and become distant, pleasant memories. It’s real sad in a way, because you build an attachment and relationship with them, and then they’re gone? Maybe I’ve been that way too, but I thought friends could last a lifetime? Despite my mistakes and imperfections, loved ones have always been there for me through thick and thin. And in tough times, family will always be there when I …

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How the Dawn Inspires

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Our family went south of Cedar City and almost made it to Arizona. There was a new area that we had never been before, and it was awesome. Big red rock cliffs came jutting out of the ground like backbones. Creosote bushes and various cacti decked the landscape clear to the horizon. We left Cedar about 6:00 A.M. before the sun even came up, just right before dawn. The Pine Valley Mountains, located south of Cedar City began glowing in a soft purple hue and then turned pink, red, and orange. The sky was burning red. The whole vista was …

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Dreaming of Bristlecone Pines

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The wind pushes through the forest like a wild stallion, roaring in a thousand rivers. In the mountains around my home, Bristlecone Pines stand high on the edges of cliffs and mountain peaks; catching and shredding the wind in their twisted branches, making it whistle and wail! I’ve been up there on those mountains, in places where no other man has ever been. I’ve befriended those ancient monsters of peace. They have chosen to grow in the most barren places. They are wise for their perseverance, and for their stubborn lives. They were on my mind tonight. I was day-dreaming. …

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Uncomfortably Restless

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It’s constantly agitating; something keeps bothering me, but I can’t identify the source? I’m dubious? There is this constant impulse to wander off somewhere? But school is an anchor. Why do I feel distraught? This city is surrounded by desert on all sides, and I’m pondering on deep beauty. We all dream. We all feel cut off. We are lonely, and need a freedom that is hard to reach. So continue to survive, because the mysteries are still singing. I can see the clouds as they travel the sky, and they are restless. There’s a quote I’ve heard, and have …

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The Sound of My Life

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My heart is humble in the face of endless landscapes and places where the modern world hasn’t invaded. Beautiful places are safe. I sometimes fear the world that we all live in. I fear those human beings that can crash airplanes into tall buildings killing thousands of people. At the same time, I fear leaders who use war and try to justify their killings. How can a war justify dead woman and children lying on the ground? Where does someone escape an ignorant worthless existence? Animals kill, but Animals never instituted a holocaust like humans are capable of doing. It’s …

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Unforgiven – The Way it Really was?

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After watching the western movie titled; Unforgiven, it reminded me of a trip my brother and I made out to Nevada, to a place called Pioche. During the late 1800’s, They say Pioche was one of the most ruthless towns in the West. It was a busy mining town and a war zone. If you visited, you ran the chance of being harassed or even killed. Murder wasn’t uncommon in Pioche, Nevada. It was also common in many other colonial frontier settlements at the time. In my opinion, this was the true history of America’s expansion into the West while …

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