deer

Two Year Blogging Anniversary–Writing on the Rim

/ Juliana Lightle / 4 Comments

To paraphrase that old adage, “time flies”.  Two years ago last week, I started blogging here at Word Press.  The following is my first blog post.  Blogging has enabled me to “meet” new people and forced me to write more poems with the consequence that within the next two months, my book of poetry will be published.

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The canyon edge looms out my bedroom windows,

pale adobe, stark.

Fall to death or serious injury!

I will not fall; I love living on the edge.

Raing brings a one hundred foot deluge,

a wall of water, red adobe, cascading, screaming.

Someone said my house is pink; it is not pink:

cold of canyon, worldwide color,

Moroccan, pueblo, Saudi, Mali, Navaho, Timbuktu,

Desert, alive and lovely.

Everywhere.

Three bucks watch me through my bedroom windows.

They see me move; they stare.

Isabella stands rigid, watching…what?

Bobcat casually climbs the canyon wall, impervious.

He marks the cedar tree, walks a deer path, disappears.

Secretive, rarely seen.

The huge hoot owl’s voice echoes down the canyon,

drifting into my dreams.

A young roadrunner calls, scatchy voice,

running across the patio–on the edge.

In the spring the mockingbird sings all night,

“This is my territory,”

I sing all year, full of joy.

I live in beauty on the rim.

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Writing on the Rim

In Silence

/ Juliana Lightle / Leave a comment

Today it warmed up considerably after some very cold weather.  I love the outdoors but  not the cold so really find cold winter weather confining.  While cleaning up a pile of brush, I noticed how quiet it was, no birds singing, no sounds, nothing  except an occasional soughing of the junipers during a wind gust.  Some friends stopped by and immediately commented on the quiet.  It suddenly struck me just how different this is from the rest of the year, especially spring and summer with endless birdsong and raucous insect symphonies.  At dusk when I finally went inside, I sat down and wrote this poem:

The deer meander along the canyon rim,

stop, browse bare bushes

in silence.

The bobcat climbs the canyon wall,

surveys his rugged realm

in silence.

The coyotes run above the rim,

watchful, wary,

in silence.

Now, in January, the birds stop to drink

from the blue birdbath, bobbing

in silence.

At night, the stars and moon

illuminate my sleep

in silence.