The unassuming Piddock clam Hidden from view Eight years or more burrowing 12 degrees forward Shell rasping against rock Then 12 again 30 times until the circling drill Of its own self Turns complete — Again and again.
On the cobbled beach Tide-filled, summer camp children-filled Moving like sanderlings escaping the waves Florescent lime t-shirts So they are all easily in view I scramble Over glinty metamorphics Some larger than Suitcases Fallen from the leaning, torn-open Conglomerate cliffs To find each holy rock Each curiously carved and hollowed Remnant of these clams’ Industry.
Grey sandstone their substrate Cylindrical passages carved as if by auger and bit Many parallel, not overlapping Partially or all the way through.
Surf-rounded Some small as pendants To wear round the neck, ready For its cord or chain For years I have passed them by Never guessing Them artifacts of undersea molluskan Conurbations.
What cities unknown and unremarked Lie all about us We urban sophisticates with our surf toys and magic wheeled vehicles Think only of ourselves While much older are the city builders Under wave Atlantians that need no Plato To tell their tale A million years and more Chiseling out the boulevards and avenues.
And what of the ants The birds The corals and mangroves All diligent in their complexity With no recourse to our war, famine or fame And I say We city people Are so much younger And still have so much to learn.
5 August 2019 Beneath the Dana Point Headlands Approaching high tide
Gift-wrapping the air Swirling, light-footed crowd fall Making me smile — First Snow.
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Fire to Ice Just yesterday, red flag wildfire warning Lingring late into November Unseasonably warm, low humidity, high winds Power blackouts, evacuations Spot fires no more than a mile away Attacked with truck, dozer and airplane Mega fires further out Darkened sky smoke plumes.
Then in a day Temperature drops a full 20 Snow falls Five days of it now, five more to come
Seasons askew, weather extreme New normal in mountain foothills Schools close, stores sell out of ice Then batteries, then generators Cars troll the darkened streets An apocalypse not of Wrath but denial.
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Gift-wrapping the air… However we reform And remake you You are still the mystery And surprise — This falling of cold white specks From an empty sky This transformation unbroken From far ocean to mountain storm To snowpack to spring melt This float of crystal sculptures Suspended in air Enclouding us
I bow before the mystery …First snow
30 November 2019 Cedar Wings Cottage, 2680' Storm-covered sky
Monday, the 25th was a high wind weather warning day, with the possibility of power shutoffs to guard against wildlife caused by electrical wires. The weeks previous saw no less than 7 power shutoff events, lasting 1 to 4 days, along with numerous small fires and a few catastrophic mega fires that burned homes in both northern and southern California. An unusually persistent high-pressure ridge had sat over Northern California, pushing aside any of the usual rain that typically arrives in the Sierra Nevada foothills after October 31st.
Tuesday, the 26, storms finally broke through, bringing a sudden, dramatic drop in temperatures and by afternoon, snow, first as white specks easily mistaken for ash from a fire, then full flakes ‘enclouding’ us in their free-fall. Day five of this arrival of winter finds us with snow still covering the ground except where the snow plows have cleared streets, with two storms around behind us, a third forecast for tomorrow, and generally cold rain or snow forecast for a full week. On the first day after storm we saw the juncos foraging for last morsels on newly fallen snow and out of sympathy put out bird seed, which they finally found – four days later – a troop of 20 dark-eyed juncos gathering in great activity of hopping, pecking, and wheeling flight as they feasted in the cold.
Both the South Fork Yuba and North Fork American drainages have their headwaters against 8 to 9 thousand foot peaks of the Sierra Crest, and both flow roughly parallel to each other to the west. They differ, however, in that the North Fork American is two to three times deeper than the Yuba. One outcome of this was that ancient glaciers filling the upper Yuba basins at various times overrode the divide between the two, creating a section of the divide where large ice falls descended into the deeper American, to join its main glacier far below.
Two recent outings to the divide gave an opportunity to better visualize this unusual topography and the spectacle of massive ice field and long-tongued glaciers that rode down from the summits as recently as 15 thousand years ago.
Razorback Ridge to Crows Nest — 17 Nov. 2019, 6 miles return, elevation gain +1,006
The ridge has outstanding views of the headwaters of both the Yuba and America drainages. Andesite, Castle, Donner, Judah and Mt. Lincoln dominate the Yuba, while Anderson, Tinker’s Knob, Granite Chief, Needle and Lyons Peak enclose the American. The ridge itself is composed of recent volcanic layers – ash, welded pyroclastic flows, and the andesite tower of Crow’s Nest. The two faces of the ridge, however, present strongly contrasting features. On the north, where the main ice field of the upper Yuba once covered the shoulders of the ridge to its crown, forest of White and Red Fir, Western White Pine, Sierra Juniper and Mountain Hemlock crowd the slope. Generally just below the ridge top, but sometimes at the top or even down the lee side a few meters are numerous glacial erratics – granodiorite – in striking contrast to the volcanic strata of the ridge itself. Jeffrey pines, in particular stand in exposed locales, often presenting broken tops and wind-sculpted limbs. The south or lee side of the ridge is steeper, mostly barren and deeply eroded into cliffs, ravines, and an irregular series of pillars and other asymmetrical forms carved out of the welded pyroclastic conglomerates. There is even one natural arch. The ascent to Crows Nest is steep only near the end, and the climb up the broken tower itself an easy class 2 scramble.
Matrimonial Ridge — 26 Nov. 2019, 4 miles return, elevation gain +971
The climb from Hwy 80 and the South Fork of the Yuba River to Matrimonial Ridge is a standard ski, snowshoe or snowmobile route in winter. Without snow it is actually more difficult, with the last roadless, trail-less part of the route dense with forest and crowded with huckleberry oak and manzanita growing between granite ridges and benches. Reaching the first summit of the exposed ridge-top leading to Fisher Lake Overlook, a place informally called ‘Matrimonial Ridge,’ There is polished granite and two solitary Jeffrey Pines. Although overridden by glaciers here at some point, the ridge stands prominently above the landscape so that all of the Granite Creek drainage, once a great ice fall down to the American, can be seen, as well as many of the same peaks of the Yuba and American seen from Razorback Ridge. Nearby is Devil’s Peak, a cockscomb-like ridge composed of columnar andesite that stood above the glaciers and acted as a topological divide between two bodies of ice descending in parallel into the American. Also striking is the uneven terrain on both sides of the divide here. Numerous ridges, hummocks, and benches, all fashioned by the glaciers out of the granite bedrock stretch out across the landscape. It makes for complicated terrain with many small lakes. most of them at the Yuba-American divide, or further down into the American River drainage. Some of these lakes, such as the three Loch Leven Lakes, have trails to them and are popular destinations. Others, such as Nancy or Fisher Lake are cross-country trips and are infrequently visited.
Glacial Maximum showing west and east flowing glaciers descending from ice fields along the Sierra Nevada Crest. Note the south-turning glacial tongues descending from Donner Pass area to join the North Fork American Glacier. From J. P. Schaffer’s, The Tahoe Sierra, 1999.Cross section showing the high glacial basin of the South Fork of the Yuba and the much deeper incision of the North Fork of the American. Both images adapted from Gaiagps.
In its large scale, the asymmetry of the two canyons — Yuba and American — is striking. Why was the American cut so much deeper? Did the overriding glaciers from the Yuba icefield contribute to this depth, or was there a pre-glacial reason? The position of the glacial passes between the Yuba and American is also interesting. From the Sierra Crest to Razorback Ridge there are no breaches in the divide between the two. Then, between Razorback Ridge and Monumental Ridge, much to the west, five major drainages cut down into the American, each one being a breach in the divide, with most of the divide in this section continuously overridden at the glacial maximum. Only two prominent features stood above this icy inundation — Palisade Peak just west of Razorback Ridge, and Devil’s Peak, which extends out south to the high wide ridge of Snow Mountain, also glacier-free.
Standing atop Matrimonial or Razorback Ridge one sees clearly how these two watersheds – the Yuba and American — are intimately linked topographically, yet dramatically different.
Are we not Like the rain beetles Males flying about urgently After rain first soaks The forest floor in fall For a few hours Then no more Each searching For that one Female Soaked in pheromones Waiting At the entrance Of her egg burrow There to mate And both Soon to die?
Are we not?
And why then Do we judge our path Through this universe More noble and right More fitted with the purposes Of heaven?
When these ancient ones Still sell their Hairy-legged, hard-bodied Aerial dances As if there were no other way To be with God.
23 November 2018 Cedar Ridge, Sierra Foothills
* Pleocoma, from the Greek, ‘abundantly hairy,’ the genus name for the 25 or so species of rain beetle found from California to Washington that wait sometimes for years for a first heavy rain of fall before emerging to complete their life cycle.
I wandered lonely trackless Having left trail out of forest broken and decayed underfoot following hummocks of granite spine into cloud-driven sky
On cold summits With their solitary jeffrey pines earth lay down Its argument Wide, fulsome, all things woven into the other the very vastness of vision A kind of bread To eat So that I need not even Spill blood To be brother With the cliff-edge rocks We who ride together this wheeling, spherical earth turtle into starlight.
25 November 2019 Fisher Overlook Ridge, 7011' A day before first winter storm
They lay heavy over the earth here once hundreds of feet thick Riding the eroded volcanic ridge Itself the ruin of millions year older Pyroclastic flows Down from mountain crest Leaving Rounded granite boulders Larger than tables Carried from Donner Peak, miles away Crumbs To this ancient white monster Scattered just below Ridge's edge
Now it is pillar saint Jeffrey Pine flat-topped, limbs sculpted Into grand upward gestures Recumbent manzanita and huckleberry oak Massive old Junipers Berries ready for harvest Volcanic gargoyle pillars Carved into ridge's lee side Conglomerate torsos, arches, fists ...And I, who am Dancer on this parapet line Between watersheds Yuba - American Their long-lost ice streams flowing still as ghosts filling the open spaces of wide canyon.
17 November 2019 Razorback Ridge-Crows Nest, 7,500-7,900' High cirrus and blue sky
Stars climb over the ridge holding luminous heads high into the darkness— clambering ants intent only on their ascent oblivious to the solitary glow of waxing moon commanding western horizon.
Steep avalanche path I scrambled up in twilight, reaching its gurgling mouth of water waist–high cow parsnip meadow at my feet green tops of forest crawling over raw flanks of peaks . . . all gone now.
In their stead one broken shard of obsidian-horizon winds scrapping at the valleys the curlew footprint of moonlight on mottled sand–bars of cloud brighter, more insistent the clambering stars.
A shudder passes through me, alone in this unyielding— as close to twig cloud, deer imagined in the darkness, to quartz as to my humanity.
Death and life make no difference for wind rubbing skin to skin on the night earth for star or forest... or hemlock sapling propped against rock–fall boulder.
9 July 1992 Rattlesnake Creek Pasayten Wilderness North Cascade
In the summer of ’92 I made a road trip to visit friends in the ‘greater west,’ stopping at Bend, Oregon, Missoula, Montana, and Lopez Island, Washington. Along the way, I ventured into various out of the way places, including this one-night foray into the Pasayten, close to the Canadian border.
A friend Returning from Bhutan Gave me a book On Emptiness… Shunyata — Nagarjuna’s four-fold Dialectic Philosophical nuance and explication Argued in monastery Courtyards on the roof Of the world.
Yes, fill me with that talk Of the emptiness of self - the Buddha way Or contrawise Of Christ’s fullness - his pleroma Declaimed by a Chrysostom Or Origin Against wine-dark waves Of an Ionian sea.
…On mountain paths It is all the same, these word scarves We wear to keep Wind out, to helpfully Trip us up, so that Wordless We stumble Into what saves us.
Far From Himalayan caves Or Mediterranean Churches I pick up one acorn cap On the trail Empty of its nut Even as a fragment Still full Of tree and forest Rain, mountain lion And sky
Standing still Mountain rides me Into darkness And back To light.
22 November 2019 Cedar Wings Cottage, 2680’ Cold sky full of cloud
* Narajuna’s Mūlamadhyamakakārikā (Root Verses on the Middle Way) c. 200 CE, first sets forth the four-fold dialectic that denies affirmation of both the existence and non-existence of things as a way to clear space for the Buddhist notion of emptiness. John Chrysostom and Origen of Alexandra were 3rd-4th century theologians both influential particularly in the Eastern Orthodox tradition. The Greek pleroma finds its way into the canon as a technical term largely through Paul’s Epistle to the Colossians.
November Drier than it has ever been In its meteorological silence Red roses bloom
In the year 709 From the founding of Rome Ab urbe condita Our 46 BCE Julius Great reformer, soon to be murdered reset the days To end the ‘wandering years’ And its calendrical Confusion
Yet drift the days still did By 3, said Bede in 800 By 7 or 8 Thought Roger Bacon much later Until again, from that same Rome Pontifical proclamation Added 10 days to the year 1582 In an instant So that anniversaries and birthdays Were missed But human order now matched The flow Of the cosmos.
Yet now in November The red rose blooms
Calendrical days do not veer But earth itself We reread the ancient apocalypses For the like of their strange signs Flood and hurricane Pestilence, war Melting ice
Seasons slip False springs occur We untruth the world And hide from it Saying that it, not us Is fake
And still, the red rose Blooms.
24 November 2019 Cedar Wings Cottage Dry earth and cloudless sky
* Ab urbe condita, from the founding of the city (Rome), Compare the Byzantine ‘etos kosmou,’ marking its calendrical year from the creation of the cosmos. In similar fashion to the work of Julius and Gregory, the International Committee on Stratigraphy is considering a date for our current geologic age, the Anthropocene, most likely dating from the deposition of radionuclides around the globe caused by nuclear testing from the 1950s.
As I pace the shore Of a cirque-lake Down from the col Entranced by its glistening Skin that dances An endless dance With no figures or progressions Save the figures of wind And the progression of sun Suddenly a surge of anguish Passes through me That I will not always Be here to watch Be here to be The spectator, unnoticed But must drink once Then pass.
Lucky the trees That hold this shore Even in death They wear their eyes Now gnarled and weathered skeletons That mark their yearning Their thirsts, their plenties And they, torn down To the shore by time Broken to dust by countless storms Do lay themselves In water’s mouth To join as one In the cirque-lake dance.
29 August 1981 Sphinx Basin, below North Guard High Sierra
While still in college I hitchhiked out to Cedar Grove in the Canyon of the Kings, a parallel Yosemite, as Muir thought of it, and climbed steeply up the Sphinx Creek trail, solo, vague about telling backpackers where I was headed, seeking solitude, continuing up the drainage, cross-country, while the trail veered off toward Avalanche Pass. Camping at the high lakes, the summit and winged shoulders of North Guard embracing me, I camped and next day scampered up talus and scree to a slight col, beyond which stood high Mt. Brewer further south on the Great Western Divide, an easy journey to its base across smooth glacial slabs, then class 3 up a chute to the summit, myself chanting the ‘Jesus Prayer’ to keep confident and in rhythm on uncharted rock. Little in record remains of that adventure, save this poem written upon returning from the peak to the barren, high lake of Sphinx Creek Basin.
Mountaineity 