Writing from the far edges of the American desert.
The mountains are calling you brother Come, they are waiting. Come, there is a secret waiting. You must go to the crossing A child in dream visits the mountains converses with bears. There is no fear. Voices dance in shadows, deep below luminous peaks beneath the candled skies. Yonder the little mountain people dance they dance and glow. In the dark earth they weave their cobwebs. Come, says the the wailing wind.
In a classroom, the professor’s voice becomes background interference. My mind is somewhere on the landscape, far off in the Great Basin of Nevada. Those big cities become ghost towns. Wind and dust pass through the shattered windows of empty skyscrapers. There’s no electricity anywhere, except for one buzzing radio sucking on its last drop of current. The storm grows enormous, sweeping across the landscape, causing everything to disappear. I’m dreaming of the deepness of rivers, and skeletons moving through the darkness of night. Sand is blowing from the dunes in summer. The Ocean’s flooding the coastlines. Hurricanes and tornadoes …
Someone rear ended me in Saint George, tonight. I don’t blame them though; they are victims in a way. The driving culture of Southern Utah is chaotic. Too many people in a hurry is the problem. It’s the dysfunctional fast lane society that we are all plugged into. The lady got a citation for following too close. My new vehicle is a 2005 Dodge Neon, maroon colored. So, I am going to need a new bumper.
I?m at the point in my life where I want to relax, and drop all material things. But I am plugged in. There?s no escape. There are those few quiet moments where I can see the cottonwoods bending in the wind, waving their mountainous branches. Or I can let the cold wind blow against my face on a late summer evening, sitting on the ledge of a sandstone cliff. I pull out of the fast lane for a few moments of intense silence, and remember when times were not so rushed, when I was innocent. My dream is in those …
The wanderlust returns? For now though, I am enjoying my schooling in Saint George. I am home in Southern Utah. I think I have found my niche in the arts. For the first time this semester I am taking art classes at the beginning level: oil painting, watercolor, and drawing; except for advanced photography. These classes are giving me instruction in areas where my talents are now being challenged. An oil painting class at the beginning level is a struggle. Yet today, I was painting and noticed that everything was falling into place. I had my own style. It actually …
This looks like this is right up my alley, I’m going to it! I have a lot of respect for Mr. Everett Ruess. I read his wilderness journals a few times, after a close relative recommended his writings to me. In all honesty, I have to give credit to Everett for being a major inspiration, and role model. I share a lot of affinity with his ideas, and his outlook! Plus, he ventured into the same wilderness that I love so much. He heard the wilderness calling him. If you hear it calling, BEWARE! At the age of twenty, Everett …
It is windy tonight. The fiery sun sinks into the mountains of burnished slopes. Stars flood the heavens deep. The canyon voice whips through the Pinion and Juniper. The basin below is cold and dusty. The mountains are singing all night. Come to me, say the mountains, travel far into the wild where the unknown waits. The Tree Man will care for you… It is in me. I’m walking through a deep forest, of gigantic pines. I can see myself moving about in the dream. I’m a tree. My arms are branches. My feet are the roots. I grow tall …
I am leaving home to be with the wild, the wind. I am leaving my comfort for the darkness of the earth and sky. Deep starry nights are singing. The desert is calling. There’s patience in my planning, but the time draws near. No one understands the mysteries of the world, or why the heavens weep. No one really sees the hidden mysteries. You have to drop the weight that drags you down. There is only one way to dream. The desert is calling. The land is going to tranform. The old way lives in my heart. My spirit is …
In those sleeping hills time does not exist. When I’m in isolation, I’m alone within the corners of God’s imagination. Below the shifting sand, I ponder previous worlds wherein mankind went absolutely crazy, and vanished. I think of the wide gaping mouth of the Grand Canyon in Arizona and the many quiet places still remaining in this world of bus and computer. But man is becoming evermore crazy. A mystery is drawing nearer, but remains patient. A thunderstorm brings the roaring rain upon housetops. Thunder reverberates through ancient canyons. Unknown rivers flow down unknown channels. This is the constant vision …
Deep cliff shadows engulf the canyon. Softened sunlight fades. Darkness comes quick. After a windy evening storm I push my feet in wet sand and listen to storm-provoked waves of Lake Powell crashing in the darkness Bats chase moths around the kerosene lamp. An owl hoots from Cottonwood skeletons. I’m 50 miles from any town trapped in Glen Canyon’s heart. The only way out is a boat. I feel the restless waters of the Colorado River wanting to burst. The lake whispers!
Well, I am going to try WordPress for a while and see if I like it! Earlier today, I imported all my entries from my Movable Type blog. I still have my Movable Type installation. I?ve spent the better part of this day, trying to figure out how to use WordPress. Things have been pretty chaotic, but the more I learn and become familiar, the easier this will be. The reason for switching over to WordPress is because there are more free templates available, it is open source software, and I like the many plug-ins available! Also I might be …
I sheep herded a few years back and worked for Burtons Livestock, out of Parowan, Utah. I couldn’t wait for lambing season to be over, to move the sheep up on the mountain. For a couple of weeks, I could enjoy the aspen and pine before my job was done. The nights spent up there were always magnificent; a billion stars lit the sky, and the pines sung like rivers. I worked with and enjoyed the company of my friend, Tsosie, a 67 year old Navajo sheepherder. It’s been a few years since I last spoke with him. He had …
A soft spoken meadowlark moves from a fence post, up into a Blue Spruce… This spruce is growing in the desert! It doesn’t look like other steepled evergreens. It’s all bent out of shape growing right up from the sage. It stands alone. Where’s the others? Hmm…
I’m the old prospector who never found gold, but fell in love with the wild. My home is out there in the wild, where I discovered quiet. I don’t claim to know everything, but it is my desire to remain uncertain about a lot of things. This allows me to be more open-minded to the perspectives of others. When I write about the landscape, I focus on the images that I see, or remember, and record how I feel. Before this blog, I was writing in paper journals. Writing is something I appreciate, even if it were for me. I …
In my sleep, I heard the wind softly whispering through the bedroom window all night. The mountain air moved about the bedroom walls, flapping the posters, shaking the window blinds. As the sun came up in the east, the soft rays came through the window and painted the bedroom wall. Last night, I slept on the urgency to leave Flagstaff. I don’t really want to leave this town, this dream. Flagstaff has become home. But the larger southwest is my home, from low desert, to the ponderosa highlands. My home is where giant thunderclouds sweep the dry desert with curtains …
The pine trees howl with wind as it whips through the forest and cloud ships sail above the evergreen steeples. That bristlecone sky is ageless. The sticks crack beneath my feet. The forest howls like river rapids. I set the camping pack against a tree, lie down on the forest floor and close my eyes. As the tireless river flows like violent waves crashing into a sandy beach at midnight. The water is restless as if waiting to drown the living. But it is peaceful and enormous. The boundary of reality fades, and the mystery washes me away to a …
Chimpanzees are genetically 98% similar to human beings. That makes them the closest living relative to the human race. So why isn’t this okay? Is science really challenging religion? Or are we just keeping our minds closed to the evidence that is out there? Humans act similar to Chimpanzees. When the human male wants to show that he is stronger then another individual, he’ll demonstrate this by throwing objects at the floor, or raising his voice, or will act in an aggressive manner. This is the way that Chimpanzees behave. So what is the difference between us and them? They …
The Jackelope is a rabbit species that inhabits the Western United States, and unlike any other type of rabbit, they grow antlers that are similar to a Mule Deer, or an Antelope. Evolutionary Theorists cannot explain as to how the Jackelope is able to produce antlers, or where this creature might have evolved. There is no evidence to explain how the Jackelope uses it’s antlers, or whether the animal is territorial or not. Walking into the Sunshine Truck Stop the other day, I saw a Jackelope mounted to the wall. Even dead you don’t see very many representations of this …
Coyote, wild and brave, thank you for coming within throwing distance of my camp that night. I was thrilled by the yips and howls of your siblings. There was an E.T. moon above the junipers, on that plateau near the Grand Canyon. I wanted to leave camp and walk in your direction, just seeing how close I could get before getting spooked.
Cloud shadows ascend castling red cliffs. I’m beneath those sailing clouds as they travel the dense blue sky. The red desert is infinite to my measly existence. Traveling down highway 89, across Dinetah, I cannot keep my eyes off the desert landscape of tall cliffs, sandstone stairways, and thick bedrock. Little Hogans stand beneath large rock faces, and steep inclines that cast their dark shadows. It’s not necessarily the geology of Northern Arizona that steals my breath, nor the process of how the Navajo Sandstone was formed, or how the Moenkopi formation came to be, or how the Painted Desert …
Out there, the desert whirl winds pass across white, cracked wastlands, beneath turquoise sky; sending tumble weeds into flight and stirring thick clouds of fine dirt. There are ranchers somewhere in those foothills below Mt. Trumbell. I am betting over half of them have never seen the Toroweap Overlook of the Grand Canyon. They’ve spent their whole lives ranching, farming, and taking care of livestock, but they really haven’t seen the complete beauty of this landscape or what hides in it? When my grandfather was a boy, he ran sheep out on the Arizona strip. He wandered all over the …
Sometimes, I feel caught up in a doomed system, or that I am about to fail myself. But when I see beautiful rock formations and the nimble clouds as they pass through the heavens, I am reminded that life is so beautiful; that to keep going is the ultimate goal. Now I just need to vent, maybe even in an abstract way. That is what this journal is for… The sky is deep black, and I am seeing the infrared trees. I am crossing the wasteland that stretches farther then the eye can see. The desert shrubs and creosote speak …
Yes, I believe that all living things have a soul. The defining characteristic for this is that most creatures have a desire to survive and reproduce, or at least the ability to do such. It is also my assumption that there doesn’t need to be a mother-child bond within every living species either. Most mammals would share this trait, but it may only play a small role in the kigdom of life. I also believe that plants and trees have deep spirits, but they don’t provide for, or take care of their offspring. Here’s a prime example of what I’m …
There is no time in the wilderness. Those red cliffs are older then human evolution. In so-called geological time, it takes millions of years to erode away mountains and create plateaus. A sandstone ridge shades twisted Junipers, and within their scaly branches, the wind never stops. Clouds constantly shift above the plateau, creating shapes that appear once, never to be seen again. They say if a tree falls over in the forest, and no one is around to hear it, should it matter? If a rockslide drops a million tons sandstone, does it matter? And does it matter that the …
Okay, I am trying to get a handle on room mates. They are starting to feel like family, so they are a social institution much like school, government, or the Mafia. So far, I enjoy the room mates, but the disagreements grow deeper. The key is silence, and learning to listen to them when they talk. For my Cultural Anthropogy class, I am supposed to do field work. I’ve been eyeing the social interaction of my room mates. How do other room mates interact with each other?
She will confuse her companion, test his might, and his will. Her insecurity kills dreams. She’s clouded, worried, and faithless. Then she stops, and changes course. All is happy again. Everything is without manipulation. A few days go by, and then she’s worried and judgmental. Then, she’s happy again, and becomes afraid. She washes the dishes with deep sorrows. The husband watches her from the kitchen table. He’s uncertain. His muscles are sulking, his feet feel heavy on the linoleum. The woman is quiet. Her conspiracy is planted. There’s an escape, and she will vanish. He cannot place a finger …
Somebody blew out all the windows in that ragged saloon. You know that old ghost town, on the edge of town? The building still stands, with broken glass on creaky floor boards. I feel deep, complex memories associated with that old western ruin. I can hear sounds from inside; something dances… a beating ghost heart… a wicked shadow still carrying two persuaders!
With this type of poetry: When it came to woman, I never saw a thing, until you, walking up and down the halls of my mind. And how I would dance to you. Maybe I’m succumbing to your deep, intrusive gaze?
The cloud shadows pass through my mind, through my spirit like flickering light. I venture into a trance-like day dream, somewhere quiet, deep into the dreamer’s wilderness. There are no cities, no structures, except black desert shadows trailing from the hot sun. The planet is a hearth of quiet suspension. I can meditate on what happened so long ago. There is nothing in my existence more powerful then the turning wind, and the flow of natural elements. Neither is there anything more great than the turquoise sky, and the deep sandstone canyons. Except for the image of an old rusty …
Well, I left Southern Utah, and I didn’t think I could. I left those familiar surroundings behind. My family is back in Utah, and I have no relatives in Northern Arizona. It has finally become quiet in my life. What I become absent from, I grow fond of. But my patience is strong, and I love a new start. If the good old AZ becomes my home, then so be it. My junk car cannot go off this mountain, because I’m afraid it wouldn’t make it back up. There is the desert below, that I want to see. There are …