Hummingbird nest over the trail.

Twin hummingbirds this morning in the nest over the trail. Waited until the mother bird came. Watched the feeding amazed her hummingbird beak didn't poke holes in their throats.

I Caught A Rat By The Tail Today

Journal entry from 2009:

I caught a rat by the tail today.  

Sorting through my things in the driveway, I heard rustling under the tarp. I looked and there it was. I thought it was a mouse. It wasn't very big, the size of a large chicken egg, big cute eyes, big cute ears, furry tail. Furry tail? Yes, furry tail. 

Reaching down I tried to grab it's cute tail but it moved. I then put my finger on it's tail and pinned it. I yanked my hand back, afraid it would turn and bite me. It ran off then. 

Later, I saw it again. This time I grabbed it. Holding it up by the tail I was suspecting it was sick. No way would a healthy rat mouse let me grab it twice like that. Just lean over and pick it up? 

Ma said it must be a kangaroo rat. That makes sense to me. It was way cuter than any house mouse or city rat. Holding her up, looking her over, I wasn't sure what to do next. Didn't want to just kill her. Didn't want to let her go in the field. If she was sick it was probably from rat poison, and anything that ate her would get sick, too. 

I ended up putting her in one of my plastic boxes with a dish of water and a piece of bread. She'll get better or die, then I'll let her go or throw her in the trash. She's dying though. Getting weaker. Laying sprawled, eyes closed, reacts less and less when I come near. She'll probably be dead in the morning. 

I never want to use rat poison. I'd rather use a trap than poison. What a terrible way to die. What a waste of life. What a terrible way to poison an ecosystem.

Epilogue: The rat was dead the next morning. I threw her in the trash. Later that day, in my mom's shed, I head rustling on the shelf. Another rat peeked it's head from behind a plastic tub, beautiful and alive. After briefly weighing pros and cons in my head, I pushed the box suddenly backwards, breaking the rat's neck against the wall. Threw the still beautiful dead rat in the field.

On Listening To My ipod In Spring

Sometimes the world has too much to say to just stop listening.

The foghorn warning cries

I know the weather before I open my eyes

water drips under the cypress trees

wetting the ground where I walk on my knees.

Red Door on the Right

I'll come calling
red-wing in flight
whistling freedom
lonely as night.
The silhouette of a ghost is there
lift my feet and dance on air.

I'll come calling
at the red door on the right
lean into the furnace
ward off the night.
I left my boots on the cobbler's stair
this sole of mine to be repaired.

I'll come calling
coyote in the night
laughing, howling,
chance that I might bite.
Don't move fast in the brown-eyed stare
I might still run if I get scared.

I'll come calling
red door on the right
lean in to the furnace
close my eyes.

I knead you

Getting ready for work, almond butter and jam on bread, "What did the baker say to the bread?" snicker to myself. Alone in the kitchen with the joke I just made up. "I told myself a joke I didn't know," I think, which is the punch line to another joke I know, I laugh more.

Later, at work with my boss and a co-worker, "Hey I made up a joke!"
"Are we going to like it?"
"No."
"Okay, let's hear it."
"What did the baker say to the bread?"
"No idea."
"I knead you," I can barely say the last word, "you" comes out as more of a shriek of held back laughter, I clap my hands and tears come out of my eyes from laughing.
Straight faces on my boss and co-worker.
"On that note, I'm going back to my office now," my boss walks out the door.
Co-worker stares at his computer.
I'm still laughing.

Pour.

I wish I could share everything I'm feeling with you just like pouring water. I'd pour and you wouldn't say, "Oh yes, I see," because you wouldn't see, you'd just feel what I wasn't saying. I love words, but sometimes they're just not enough.