In the Desert of Words and Sand

What's That You Say?

A couple of weeks ago, I wrote with friends using author, Natalie Goldberg's Rules of Writing. One of the group gave this prompt: "If you praise a word, it becomes a poem." We had five minutes to do something and my recent trip to Chloride, AZ, a desert-rat community outside of Las Vegas came to mind. 

Dryness

by me

Earth to Dust

Only dryness allows this.

Dust to Earth

Only moisture makes this.

Mud to Clay

Only water and sun creates this.

Life Well Lived

Only earth, water, sun, and love does this trick.

Very often, I find that Goldberg's rule to "just write" whether it's crap or not is wise. It reminds me of panning for gold, something I did as a small child in Wickenburg, AZ. Lots of shiney and useless stuff and once in while a piece of "fools gold" or a pretty bit of quartz. Rarely did I shake out real gold, but the time or two that I did find it, kept me going.

The Pursuit of Ugliness

It Can't Help Itself

The Destructive Boll Weevil - Killer of Cotton

The weevil is a persistent mindless digger. It is a traveler looking for a soft resting place before it bores into its young host. It feeds. It probes the tender unformed flower bud with its huge snout, gouging scars where other weevils are born. The young plant so healthy, so longing for life, beginning to bloom, and becoming a fully formed beauty is stunted at best. The flower is consumed and killed most often. It becomes fodder for the weevil world. Where once this living being colored the landscape with vivid green, it has become a sickly grey shadow in this overused wasteland, seething with voracious weevil children. The weevil lives to consume and destroy. It can't help itself.