by Kendall Merriam

Carlos Santana Wins Medal
     for My Brother Parker and All Drummers

Every time I listen to his music
I think of you
Maybe you are playing
In his band
Or perhaps in one of
The Muscle Shoal’s back up groups
Or maybe Joni Mitchell
Took you by the hand
Made you her drummer and lover
I never saw you dead
All possibilities are open
All those times you ran away
Perhaps you were just looking
To sit in in some bar
And prove what you could do
On a full set
Not the split conga
That I bought for you
One Christmas in Boston
For $12.00
Our parents couldn’t understand
The need for music
In your mind, heart and soul
Were you listening to sounds
From somewhere else
In our brilliant, giant Universe
Are you playing now
In Jesus’ night club
With pretty women
Eyeing you from the audience
Wanting to take you home!

Listening to “The Best of Santana”

by Dana Wilde

When seeds fly goldenrod & ragweed
Racing driven wind like birds
Across the sky, and sky like blue
From north wind water upward through
The clear & resonant air of fall
Reflects September seas,
The floods of summer cool in breezes;
Winter is a dark & reckless thing.

Reflections from the fluent earth
In tones immerse the clouds & burst
With measures warmer than the summer sun,
For you by sanctifying air
Reward irradiations field & straw
Resuming seed & leaf. The frost now thaws.

by Dana Wilde

the wind riffling dead grass
   waves in the blue water
   brown leaves hanging from bushes
   milkweed feathers:
the last exhalation of life, this time.

the wind bruises my nose
   the water beats a sailboat toward the beach
   oak leaves run like little kids in droves
   bright red berries falling off bare branches:
it turns & takes its last look at the cottage.

we used to hunt in these woods.
   we stepped on brittle twigs,
   we brushed through pine needles,
   we saw squirrels with their mouths full of acorns.
we teetered on the edge of winter with the bare poplars.

the cold clear air shows up the northern cross
   pindrifts in the sky, a bright one, Vega
   half the moon dumping light into the sea
   Orion’s belt & another bright one, Sirius:
the late illumination of the sky this time.

thirteen geese in a chevron
   a gang of seagulls
   a chickadee among some naked branches
   four crows circling over a grove of pines
the last southern sunlight stuns their wings.

a black & red wool jacket
   heavy socks and gloves
   a sweater in the shade, a shirt for sunlight
   hats & freezing ears:
turn, turn, turn,   change or fade, adjust or die; adjust.

by Bruce Holsapple

Walked a scrawny trail thru
the grass & trees east
from Carizzozo Canyon
searching for Grapevine Spring
a beguiling name, given
the scant rainfall here —
& to learn why that watershed
pours north rather than west,
like related dry washes do

As I hiked the brush deepened
fought a way out, twigs snapping}
my face, sweat in my eyes
stumble forward, gain ground,
but it’s a whole lot of work
to look where it is
you’re headed

or for that matter
where you’ve been —

spot the lighter green
of cottonwoods, so there’s the spring
no grapevines to be seen
scuffle about, hoping to strike
a trail that goes
up & thru the mountains
the possibilities of self–definition renewed

*
Hillsides, rock outcrop, cactus
who knows what you’ll see
atop this particular rise
(probably another peak to climb
just out of view — )
a landscape inhabited
“one step at a time”
there’s always further to go
one more chore

Why’d it take me this long
to figure that? O because youth
has no obligations
save what’s imposed
no inborn need to carry thru
There’s what you get away with
then get carried away with

*
Or stumbling up a rocky mountainside
almost ankle deep in stone, tufts of grass
still brown, although the rainy season’s started
sky overcast, the temperature
a dry 80 degrees
not easy or beautiful
but a heightened state for sure!
follow a wayward arroyo
see where the elk & deer go
how the trees spread
depending on drainage
feel the depth, wherever it lets you in
Wind swirling thru here a thousand years
find myself riveted
tracing the changes back
discover the flow of the land
the watershed & view