Archive for the ‘Sonoran Desert’ Tag
Spring Awakening -- Image by kenne
Along the mountain's winding trail,
Spring scatters blossoms on the breeze.
Purple lupines sway and bow,
While golden poppies light the leaves.
The Santa Catalinas glow
In shades of yellow, red, and blue.
Each blossom is a mountain song,
Brief, bright, and forever true.
Anna's Hummingbird On Nest -- Image by kenne
A branch, a nest, a bird.
Nothing more is needed.
Spider silk binds the walls,
lichen softens the edges.
The Anna's hummingbird rests there,
breathing with the rhythm of the desert morning.
Sonoran Sunset -- Image by kenne
The mountains darken, but above them
red, orange, and yellow gather
like old spirits around a fire,
warming the vast desert silence
one final time before night.
Sonoran Spring Wildflowers — Image by kenne
Along the trail,
the desert wildflowers arrive quietly—
yellow, violet, white—
as if the desert, after months of restraint,
has decided to speak
in small bursts of color.
Hiking into the Morning Sun — Image by kenne
The desert does not hurry us.
Even the sun takes its time
climbing the ridge,
spilling light into every hollow.
We hike, and something in us
loosens—
as if the day is not something to conquer,
but something to meet
with open arms.
Red-tailed Hawk Over Tucson Skies — Image by kenne
Morning lifts on quiet thermals,
and there you are—
a single intention
written against the light.
Not striving, not hurried—
just the slow agreement
between feather and wind.
If I could learn anything today,
let it be this:
how to trust what carries me.
Sonoran Blue Sky — Image by kenne
The sky lays itself down
across the mountains
like a second world—
blue poured into stone.
No sermon here,
just light telling rock
what it already knows.
(In November of 2012, Tom Markey and I posted an article, Ecocide Arizona Style — The Cow That Ate The West.
The article was about the disappearing water in the San Simon Valley in southeast Arizona. This poem suggest the verdict is in.)
Ecocide Arizona Style
The west is dying of thirst.
You can hear it in the cracked riverbeds,
in cottonwoods gone skeletal,
in the silence where frogs used to sing.
The Colorado staggers,
a vein opened too long,
bled for lawns,
for swimming pools,
for another desert empire of cul-de-sacs.
This is not drought—
this is the verdict.
We were warned,
and we kept on building
as if the sky were infinite.
Mark it well:
when the last drop dries,
sand covers the southwest,
the desert will not mourn us.
It will simply
take itself back.
— kenne
Zerene Cesonia Caterpillar — Photo-artistry by kenne
Morning in the desert garden:
a caterpillar clings to its stem,
eating with the steady rhythm
of breath itself.
Even the sun pauses—
as if it knows a butterfly
is practicing.
— kenne
Sabino Sunrise — Image by kenne
Dawn spills over the mountains
and the giants wake.
Their shadows stretch like old cowboys
after a long night.
No hurry.
No apology.
Just another day
outlasting us all.
— kenne
Cedar Waxwings Arrive Without Announcement — Image by kenne
Soft crests,
yellow-tipped tails—
a small northern fire.
We host them briefly.
The desert offers fruit,
water,
a resting branch.
Hospitality is an old law.
— kenne
Cactus Art Image by kenne
A slight shift of angle—
the needles ignite.
So it is with the soul:
what guards the heart
can also shine.
— kenne
A Sonoran Morning — Image by kenne
Bright sunlight, black tower, white sky.
The blades carve the morning into pieces.
Somewhere a tank fills,
somewhere a man believes
he has mastered this land.
But the wind owns the rhythm,
and the desert keeps the final say.
— kenne
Soaptree Yacca — Image by kenne
Wind scrapes the flats raw.
The yucca holds its green knives
close to the bone of earth.
Bloom is rare.
That’s the point.
In this place
beauty is earned slowly.
— kenne