[This week we’ll be saying goodbye to summer with three summer-themed poems I wrote during the summer. This untitled poem I wrote last summer, shortly after the birth of my son.]
Down in the hemlocks
I brought my young baby
My boy in a blanket
And swaddled him there
Under the hemlocks
Down by the river
The cold stony river
Under the shade
.
[For Noah]
I’m happy to announce that a short story I wrote, called “Last Day in April”, earned honorable mention in Glimmer Train‘s June Fiction Open writing contest.
I would love to share the story with my readers, but I am going to try and hold on to it for publication. If it happens, readers, you will be the first to know. Other than my family. All I can tell you is that if you like the work of Stephen Chbosky you might like this one.
I realize I haven’t shared any short pieces on this blog. Perhaps I ought to tease a few freebies in the near future.
Thank you to the editors at Glimmer Train for reading my story and placing me in Honorable Mention. They are a journal I really look up to, and it’s an honor to be considered.
[This week we’ll be saying goodbye to summer with three summer-themed poems I wrote during the summer.]
Picking Blueberries at 3 Birds
by Caleb Coy
I bring my son for the first time
To pick berries from the vine
Thirteen months old, he grabs them
By the handful
Out of the bucket
And off of the ground.
Clustered like grapes
They twist and pull
and fall into our buckets lightly.
Hand in hand we walk
Through the rows of the glade.
Among the gatherers
Among the Dutch visitors who came at dawn
In a cool June morning
When broke out the sun.
A belly full of berries
He rides on my shoulders
And gibber-gabbers
About sweet warm berries
In a perfect morning
Of a perfect day
The perfect day is pesticide free.
[For Noah]
Here is a link to 3 Bird’s Berry farm.
[This week we’ll be saying goodbye to summer with three summer-themed poems I wrote during the summer. This first number, based on my fishing trip, is a parody of “The Rime of the Ancient Mariner” by Samuel Taylor Coleridge.]
The Rime of the Anglyng Touryst
by Caleb Coy
It is an angling Tourist,
And he renteth a cheap rod.
“I’ve cut my shrimp in quarters.
Will I catch me a cod?”
Optimistic as the rising sun,
He casts out with a wink
(Because it’s all in the wrist,
Or so he’s been told to think).
He feels a little wiggle
He feels a little pull
“I think I’ve got a live one!
I’ve yanked him from the shoal!”
Alas, on pillars snagged—
It appears that when he cast
A wave brought his line inward
To the pier the hook held fast!
He gives a friendly wave
To a stranger down the pier,
Who knows what he is doing—
(That’s why he fishes here).
Then comes another tug—
“This time it is for real!”
A big knot he untangles,
But soon he’ll have his meal.
Perched above, a pelican—
Patiently it stares,
Chin tucked with the posture
Of a fasting saint in prayer.
[Dedicated to Charley Gwaltney]
Donald Miller tries to come up with the perfect title for his new book.
In my blog series on Michael Pollan’s The Omnivore’s Dilemma I digested the book, with an emphasis on the Christian perspective, as reader who is not an expert on nutrition, the environment, the economy, or agriculture.
Like Pollan, I also went on my own food adventure. Mimicking his journey, I also decided to meditate on eating an industrial meal, a supermarket meal, a locally organic natural meal, and a wild meal. I tried to mimic his as much as possible, but I didn’t have the time or the budget to match his precision with all four meals. I tried, and for purpose of reflection and comparison. There’s no point in reading a non-fiction book unless we incorporate it into action, and this sequence is the beginning of my action.
Continue reading
For his birthday we will sit at a picnic table under a lone tree burning in the desert, a heraldic tree the passing storm had left afire, a solitary pilgrim drawn upon before it traveled far and knelt in the hot sand and held its numbered hands out while all about in that circle.
I’d like to make him a birthday cake like a bloodstained stone, the marks of steel upon it, his name carved in the corrisible lime among stone fishes and ancient shells, with a serrated horizon of the Cascade Range stenciling a purple jag-toothed saw blade before the incadnadine residue of a sun recently gone to its reward. Things dimmed and dimming. The dry sea floor. The tools of migrant hunters.
I would light a candle and have him make a wish of the dreams of some world that never was or some world that never will be, encased upon the blades of men.
I would wrap his present with wrapping paper decorated with small owls that crouch silently and stand from foot to food and tarantulas and solpugas and vinegarroons and the vicious mygale spiders and beaded lizards with mouths black as chowdog’s, deadly to man, and the little desert basilisks that jet blood from their eyes and the small sandvipers like seemly gods, silent and same.
He would tear his present open and find the peregrine bones of a prophet. And silence. And the gradual extinction of rain. And the coming of night.
Happy Birthday, Cormac!
[all language above is taken directly from or adapted from the works of Cormac McCarthy. They are not my words. Except for the “happy birthday” part.]
A Digest of The Omnivore’s Dilemma Part 6: Resolving Our Food Dilemmas
or
“What is the perfect meal, anyway?”
“The blessing of the omnivore is that he can eat a great many different things in nature. The curse of the omnivore is that when it comes to figuring out which of those things are safe to eat, he’s pretty much on his own.” -M.P.
Humans are able to eat so many things, and yet so much that we eat (or can eat) is also harmful. We have natural instincts that keep us from dying, like taste, disgust, and the feeling of a full belly. But we also like to refuse to listen to our body, or our mind.
Continue reading
A Digest of The Omnivore’s Dilemma Part 5: Eating Animals
or
“Should People Eat Tasty Animals?”
“Every good hunter is uneasy in the depths of his conscience when faced with the death he is about to inflict on the enchanging animal.” -Ortega y Gasset
For his book’s journey Pollan ate (and explored) a McD’s meal, a supermarket “organic” meal, and then a local, organic, sustainably farmed meal. His final meal requires two hunts: One hunt for fungi, and another hunt for pig. I learned a whole lot about fungi, but what I mostly want to talk about is the hunting of animals.
I’ve never killed a mammal for food. I’ve know many who have, and have tasted of what they killed. I even once ate a deer hit by a truck (thanks to my friend T-Dogg). When I was little my dad took me hunting but I didn’t have the patience for it. The same went for fishing, although I remember chopping the heads off a couple fish before my dad cleaned them. I’ve always wanted to go through the experience of hunting just once. It fascinates me now. In one way because of the art and poetry of going off into the woods and hunting for food, being alone, accomplishing the hunt, performing an activity older than buying cooking. Another way it fascinates me is the almost sadistic attitude some hunters have, and how some people hypocritically look down on hunting yet eat meat that is killed in less authentic ways than hunting.
Continue reading
A Digest of The Omnivore’s Dilemma Part 4: Big Organic and the Supermarket Pastoral
or
“The Proof is in the Organic, Natural Flavor, No-Preservatives-Added, Corn-Syrup-Free Pudding”
“Organic.” “Natural.” “Sustainable.” “Free range.” “Vegan.” “Gluten Free.” “Diabetic friendly.” “No preservatives.” “Low Carb.” “Contains no added elements.” “Kid tested; mother approved.” Lots of labels out there these days that are specialized. What do they mean, and can we trust them?
