Yetman Trail — Panorama by kenne
beautiful vistas
where the desert speaks
by not disturbing
your solitude
— kenne
Archive for the ‘Sonoran Desert’ Tag
Yetman Trail Panorama Leave a comment
Sombrero Peak In Saguaro National Park Leave a comment
Hiking Sombrero Peak, located in Saguaro National Park–West, is a 3.3-mile out-and-back hike
with 1500 cumulative feet of elevation gain. — Panorama by kenne
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Too Close To The Edge Leave a comment
Tucson Basin, August 31, 2022 — Panorama Image by kenne
Blue sky above
a winding highway
on a sunkissed morning.
Tourists in rental cars
stop at Windy Point vista
climbing boulders
for a better view —
children too close
to the edge.
— kenne
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In The Desert, Only Golfers Walk On Grass 1 comment
Desert Golf Course — Image by kenne
Lizard don’t golf
Does anyone here remember
heat dancing off the sand
living land
the shifting dunes of september
now entombed in golf course green
so obscene
travelers came to see desert sights
searching for exotic places
empty spaces
stayed for warm days, star filled nights
building homes in paradise
closed eyes
banished the desert from its place
visitors need a permit to pass
keep off grass
Made a playground from the empty space
golfs a game anyone may play
they say
claiming a course is better than the desert waste
but the lizards who paid
never played
— Luann Pfost
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Morning Walk In The Catalina Foothills Leave a comment
Morning Walk In The Catalina Foothills — Image by kenne
Let me tell you a story of Nature
and my early morning walks in the
desert. The fragrance of cactus blossoms
and the starkness of its beauty beckon.
Or, is it the silence, like no other, interrupted
only by the hum of bees and tiny species
who materialize when you draw a handful
of sand to your eyes, viewing them as equals.
— from A Desert Walk by Constance La France
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Invoking the Full Meaning of Life 6 comments
I’m Just A Traveler In Other People’s Reality — Image by a Fellow Higher On The Trail
Invoking the Full Meaning of Life
How best to express sharing new life
when each moment deserves its face.
What seems apropos for the moment,
when the next moment fosters a unique experience.
Is it in a number?
The number of days?
The number of thoughts?
The number of heartbeats?
The number of turns?
The number of prayers?
. . . you can count the ways,
only to still not know life’s score.
Is it in a word?
Loving?
Caring?
Sharing?
Giving?
Sheltering?
Words to communicate thoughts and feelings
when manifested in knowledge and experience.
Or is it in art?
Transforming thought,
expressing feeling,
experiencing emotions and
the desire to evoke life,
even when distance
appears to separate a lifelong bond.
I wrote this in the 1990s. Since then, retirement and moved 1,000 miles from where we had spent 25 years, putting distance between bonds. In the twelve years since moving, we have watched the bonds drift away, causing me to question the desire to evoke life, even when distance can’t separate a lifelong bond.
We moved to the Sonoran desert with the illusion that friends and family would be beating a path to our new home in the desert southwest — not such luck. So we try staying in touch through social media, often questioning whether the bonds were ever real — confirming that we remain tourists in other people’s reality.
I once read a posting by blogger Old Jules, “These damned ego-warts.”
Old Jules was a 70-year-old hermit, living with three cats somewhere in the Texas Hill Country and writing a blog I enjoyed reading from time to time. Old Jules, who passed away April 21, 2020 at 74, had concluded that he has spent over a third of his life “being insignificant in the lives of others.”
In 1992, after 25 years of marriage and a career of 20 years, he began a new career and life in Santa Fe.
“All secure in the knowledge the extended family and friends remaining behind were part of my life in which I’d been and remained important.”
Over time he concluded it was all an illusion.
“Kids, young adult nephews, and nieces I’d coddled and bounced on my knee pealed out of my life-like layers of an onion. Most I never heard from again.”
He began to realize that he was merely tolerated, “. . . a piece of furniture in their lives.”
Over time he rebuilt his life with a more potent dose of skepticism concerning his worth and place in the lives of others, which resulted in his becoming a hermit.
“I no longer assume I’m important in the lives of other human beings and get my satisfaction in knowing I’m at least relevant to the cats.
Because cats, though sometimes dishonest, aren’t capable of the depth and duration of dishonesty humans indulge regularly.”
Old Jules had come to believe “. . . that life is entirely too important and too short to be wasted in insignificance.”
His new awareness of life is now in teaspoon measurements, “. . . measured in contracts with cats not equipped to lie. A determination in the direction of significance measured in teaspoons of reality,
as opposed to 55-gallon drums of dishonesty and self-delusion.”
“Teaspoons, I find, don’t spill away as much life in the discovery
when they’re found to be just another ego-wart of pride and self-importance.”
Bonds, illusion or not, have difficulty being when the moments are separated by time and distance, becoming gleams of light, for an instant, in the long night.
I understand where Old Jules was coming from and feel his disillusionment. There is, however, a binding force that comes from a homesick longing to be whole, to have completion, as Plato described in the myth of the human halves passionately striving towards one. Like all mythical totalities, humans are subject to the triple dramaturgical rhythm of primal completeness, separation catastrophe, and restoration. The most significant attraction effect occurs between the second and third acts of life’s drama, which is where I find myself today — maybe this is also where Old Jules is. I am learning to understand myself from a new divide, one half experienced, the other inexperienced — in such a way that I’m learning to understand myself in new ways.
But then, there are the darn cats!
Kika, what do you think?
Kika (She passed away December 10, 2011.)
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Purple Cactus Leave a comment
Purple Cactus — Image by kenne
“I’m Not Like The Others!”
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Communicating With Nature Leave a comment
Morning Shadows in the Canyon with a Friend (Greater Roadrunner)– Images by kenne
Surprise
Since moving to the Sonoran Desert,
I have had the time and inclination to
Communicate with the stars, trees,
And animals; able to live more intensely.
To walk in the morning as the sun
Comes up over the Rincon Mountains
Casting long shadows along the path as
The sky keeps its freshness from the night.
The air is crisp. I watch as birds fly by
Evoking in my thoughts, the dawn breeze
Becomes brisker, creating movement sounds
Percussion for the bird’s songs.
— kenne
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Glowing Sunset Leave a comment
Glowing Sunset — Image by kenne
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Desert Landscape Leave a comment
Desert Landscape — Image by kenne
“Alone in the silence, I understand for a moment the dread which many feel in the presence of primeval desert,
the unconscious fear which compels them to tame, alter or destroy what they cannot understand, to reduce the wild
and prehuman to human dimensions. Anything rather than confront directly the anti-human, that other world
which frightens not through danger or hostility but in something far worse – its implacable indifference.”
― Edward Abbey
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The Sonoran Sun 2 comments
The Sonoran Sun — Image by kenne
the Sonoran sun
bringing on the summer heat
monsoon to follow
— kenne
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Hiking In Bighorn Country Leave a comment
Hiking Bighorn Country In The Santa Catalina Mountains — Image by kenne
“Nature” is what we see—
The Hill—the Afternoon—
Squirrel—Eclipse—the Bumble bee—
Nay—Nature is Heaven—
Nature is what we hear—
The Bobolink—the Sea—
Thunder—the Cricket—
Nay—Nature is Harmony—
Nature is what we know—
Yet have no art to say—
So impotent Our Wisdom is
To her Simplicity.
— Emily Dickinson
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Prickly Pear Cactus Blossoms Leave a comment
Prickly Pear Blossoms — Images by kenne
Desert’s Beauty
it blooms in the spring
cactus flower everywhere
desert’s beauty thrives
— Anna M Shepard
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On The Move Leave a comment
“On The Move” (Greater Roadrunner)– Images by kenne
Greater roadrunner
Enjoys getting attention
Of those around him.
— kenne
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Life In A Flower Leave a comment
Cactus Blossom Art by kenne
Life in a flower
Just a brief moment in time
So life can move on.
— kenne
Becoming is Superior to Being 