Eliza Daley ~ Wordcraft & Musing on Home & Hope
Now the rudbeckia are opening. The topmost leaves on the maple trees have a faint wash of orange overlaid on green. And the roadside stands of goldenrod are beginning to turn into fields of sunshine. It is just shy of the season of Lughnasadh. We’ve nearly made it through July, and now the blessedly cool… Continue reading Roasting!
It’s burning again. Look out across this river valley at the old volcano warts and there doesn’t seem to be enough to keep a churro fed, never mind an inferno. What’s it eating when there’s nothing but grit and gravel and black rock? I don’t go over that way enough to puzzle out that riddle.… Continue reading Desert Pyre: Winifred Mumbles
A Full Moon Tale for the Strawberry Moon There’s a layer of ash visible high in the walls of the arroyo. It lenses in and out, thickening and thinning, breaking into eerie grey smiles in the upper bank face. It is not old. Bright plastic riddles the layers underneath this ash like malignant confetti and… Continue reading Arroyo Strawberries: Winifred Mumbles
Sunrise over the Cerro Pelado Fire, Jemez Caldera, New Mexico opening day’s eye pierces dawn shredding fragile cloud with sun daggers rising light enlivening early lizards on red rocks warming creosote bush scent and following the dipping dance of the hummingbird salt cedars stand sentinel through the drought in spectral rivers of sand where the… Continue reading caldera summer sunrise
The problem? How do you mark this day? Most years, I don’t. I’m not Hispanic. My best friend growing up was Mayan and there were complicated feelings about Mexico related to that. I never thought there was much to celebrate. We learned in grade school that it’s a commemoration of a 19th century Mexican victory… Continue reading Cinco de Mayo
It’s my week to tend to the box people. Don’t know why I signed up for a whole week in January. The Wolf Moon is the hardest time of year. But they were so grateful down in the valley when I did that I didn’t have the heart to change it. So now… forty-six years… Continue reading Box People: Winifred Mumbles
It’s my birthday. Think I might be seventy-eight. Hard to keep track of things like that. There was that kerfuffle over calendars, some folks demanding a clean slate. As if the year number could erase history. As if anything could clean up this mess. But if it makes them feel better, it also doesn’t hurt… Continue reading Apple Cake: Winifred Mumbles
I tossed out what many seem to have construed as a slur on Western Americans last week, mostly, I confess, for the alliterative qualities of the phrase. (Because I do like me some euphony.) I said Burqueños are “laconic and lazy” (and not much interested in your specialness). Far from being derogatory, this is high… Continue reading In Praise of Laziness
I saw Mama again last night. Just sitting in her favorite chair in the kitchen. She looked content. She doesn’t speak in these dreams, but there is hope in her eyes. I miss her so much, my heart just breaks when I see her. I think maybe some of the old stories may be right… Continue reading Mama’s Chair
Nine thousand years. Maybe ten. Maybe fifteen. Five hundred generations. Of humans that is. Nine thousand generations of this. Nine thousand years of fields green with three sisters. The gold of tassels, rust of pods, sun orange and berry red of squash. I feel the breath of my ancestors in these gardens, stirring leaves and… Continue reading 9000 Years (Winifred Mumbles)
By My Solitary Hearth 