Two black scouts on foot
Lead up two pointers
Their handlers, mounted,
Follow
Two mounted judges
Watch the scene
“Ready, boys?”
Handlers nod, scouts let ‘em go Read more
Opening Cast Off
Category: Poetry
Maud and Bird
They were my father’s last draft team
Mares black and bay
Grade Belgians 15.5 hands
Maud Lead Bird Off
I remember sitting on his lap
As he sat on the steel bucket seat
Of the mowing machine
Their lines in my small hands Read more
Wendell Berry
The death of Wendell Berry
Is the end of a long life-he was 92
Well lived more so than most any
Brings sadness but joy too
For he suffered no decline or disability
Died in his sleep in his home
With family surrounding
Read more
Labor Day in the Blue Ridge
In the Blue Ridge
Where I’ze raised
At Iver Johnson 20 Gauge
Four things came together:
Football practice
Squerill season
Chinquapins ripening
Chiggers Read more
Unknown Hole
Bob Cain and Booty Blevins
Was up in North Dakota
Their twentieth summer
Working bird dogs
They’d come up from South Georgia
Where they was based at
Where they lived in a single wide
When not on the circuit or training on prairie
Bob was the handler
Booty the scout
But in truth they was both
Bird dog Gypsies Read more
Boyhood on a Mountain Farm
Bluegrass and clover
Blanket steep Appalachian hills and valleys
Greening in spring
Feeding cattle and sheep
They graze gain and bear calves and lambs
On our least-sloping land we plow harrow and plant
Alfalfa for hay
Then pray for rain
Read more
A Good Bird Dog
A good bird dog
Is a gift from God
If you get one
You owe it care
You owe it time
When young to learn
To stay with you
And search the front Read more
A Run-Off
Two handlers wake before dawn And roll from their lumpy beds In a field trial motel near the grounds Their tasks for the day are a run-off Then a two-hundred-mile-haul in their duallys pulling trailers They wish the judges had flipped a coin Given one the Championship, the other R-U Champ But no, they must instead have this Waste a day And throw everyone’s plans in a mess They grab Read more
Sam’s Last Brace, Part II
The first hour filled with action
Sam’s dog Rip was reaching well
Liked this country with its edges
Rip found quail twice
With style and good location
His manners perfect at their flush Read more
Sam’s Last Brace, Part I
Sam woke Monday ‘fore dawn
Rolled over, found the lite switch
Squeezed it on, slipped off the bed
Shuffled to the bathroom
Relieved himself, pulled on his clothes
Boots last, then out the door Read more