Philosophy for the cowboy golfer

Domesticated Birds and the Bison They Would Like to Sleep On

By John Clay Foster, 7-29-08

When the rooster doesn’t croak at dawn, we wake up to the sound of cars and busy people.  The dog barks, a nail squeaks and thump, construction two houses away.  This is the myth of the West, and my tendency is to personify everything, give it a name and dream it.  Glorified and egoistic, the state becomes human, lights a BIC, and smokes a camel. *blowing smoke*

Rivers watch with tiny eyes, helping spawning-trout run through mighty-tight stretches like blood—veins around arteries, swirling through prairies, valleys, aborted by a beaver and confluence with the big.  The hills have peaks, with trees to mountains and snow in June.  Two bald eagles enjoying three white fish.  *munch-munch and a crack*

Horses have lifestyles, like drunken wild men.  They create fires in caves deep within expansive ranges, away from any breeder or whisperer, or rich family with five hundred lots of land.  The buffalo huddle together with winter breaths that ice back fros and mullets running all the way down their spine and out the tail.  They were food, they are still food.  The Native American—Indians grandfather ran one-thousand off the edge of a cliff.  Half died; the others wiggled with broken legs and ribs, and made noises like Ohhh, and ahhhh.  These days we shoot them in the head, they still make noises like Grrrrr and Argh.

Open a book and imagine grizzly bears licking soda-pop ripples of water and ratty mountains with arms that grab skies and pull down curtains over purple civilizations.  These abstracts fit the experience, the living, the life—seagulls bathing in the middle of Canyon Ferry Lake (I thought they favored salt).

The bricks are falling from century old landmarks; the brewery down Wallace.  Tears come from collapsed window frames, collect puddles in the street.  A family of pigeons scared, tuck back in a corner, a little squab screams and asks its mother what’s happening.  The Forman talks business below, says the count is somewhere near two-hundred thousand.

Historic buildings that I grew up with, on corners, disappear, I can only watch as each new crane swoops half clocks through wooden beams—right hand forward left hand back, left hand forward, right hand back.  Big metal mouths that wear goofy retainers and eat bunny rabbits for breakfast before the workers arrive. 

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