7 STARS FOR 7 BEARS

A Praise Poem for our Teton Stars: Mama Grizzlies 399 and 610

                                              by Lyn Dalebout

                              

1. our Bears are numbered

610 and 399

a daughter and her mother

five cubs in tow

combined

these Bears were given numbers

the first time they were trapped

marked with ear tags~choke chains

a way of being tracked

2. we’ve watched them trade one cub

traveling

between two moms

sometimes it seems all 7

are functioning as one

3. Bears are sidereal Sagittarians

born in the underground spring

hatched beneath the Earth

in the sign of

vision

birthing the new dream

4. we are blessed by

Bear ambassadors

fierce love and protection

inhabits their souls

Grizzly Mothers

Bear Mothers

in honoring

them

we become more

whole

5. Ursa Major   Ursa Minor

7 stars in each heavenly Bear

Ursa Major    Ursa Minor

Great Bear and Little Bear

celestial Bears   earthly Bears

mirror one another

emissaries

visionaries

~how to live amongst each Other~

6.are Bears days numbered?

indeed

if we ignore their needs

vast room to roam

              free

hundreds of miles to move

             unseen

our Bears are numbered

so in deeds

we must hold strong

guarding the wildness of territory

more land

that’s what keeps them from harm

7.               These 7 Bears

                  are our 7 Stars

                     thankfully

             ~they hold our hearts~

 

Lyn Dalebout lives in Moose Wyoming in Jackson Hole beneath the majestic Grand Teton mountains. For more information about her astrological services, teaching, writing and poetry, please visit her web site: www.earthwordskyword.com, lyn@earthwordskyword.com

Exquisite Praying Mantis

In my grandfather’s garden on St. Mary’s Street,

they crept, stemmy creatures with Popeye arms.

Every day at lunch we assembled toy blocks

with letters around the chipmunk’s fountain.

Eating peaches, juice running down our chins,

sticking fingers tossing pits in the grass,

watching the clouds fly by and imagining the

exquisite animals,

feeling the clouds filling my eyes, throwing

all the strange creatures into shadows of shapes.

The winged creatures donned their shadows,

landing beneath the clouds in peace,

two and two flew throughout the night,

and all five felt the magic of flight.

- by Mary Lynn Callahan, Tammy Christel, Meg Daly, Alice Grant, Sue Mortensen, Benj Sinclair, and Olivia Wheeler

This poem was created at the National Museum of Wildlife Art in conjunction with the “Exquisite Animal” exhibit, which runs through February 5, 2012, at 2820 Rungius Road.

Exquisite Heron

The great blue heron broke her driftwood pose;

her wings plumed wide, over the stream she rose.

Rising high above the crystal waters,

a journey to a far off place she goes.

Floating on the air

the eagles’ wings flow,

gnashing their teeth

on a rumpus they go.

Glistening in the moonlight,

the blue, blue moonlight,

shimmering beams of stars

dance gleefully in azure.

Points of light coming from

how far? No one is sure.

- by Meleta Buckstaff, Carrie Geraci, Amy Goicoechea, Jennifer Hoffman, Doug Miller, Terry Roice, and Carol Schneebeck

This poem was created at the National Museum of Wildlife Art in conjunction with the “Exquisite Animal” exhibit, which runs through February 5, 2012, at 2820 Rungius Road.

Exquisite Chickadee

Dapper chap in your cap

and ebony cravat, sing, sing!

Though darkness brings fearsome shadows,

within the blackness there be stars.

So sing into the night,

sing until the sky shines like diamonds.

In the dawn, the cold rocks grace your skin.

Pick up the red balloon and run.

And the sun

calls all beings into life.

Livin’ the dream!

- by Meg Daly, Kjera Strom Henrie, Elizabeth Kingwill, Rob Kingwill, and Abbie Miller

This poem was created at the National Museum of Wildlife Art in conjunction with the “Exquisite Animal” exhibit, which runs through February 5, 2012, at 2820 Rungius Road.

Exquisite Porcupine

She nibbles on old wooden steps,

wild roses shrink away in awe,

ambles on her way

poking around… curiously,

wondering why…

but knowing not.

The dark lines

would lead her back.

The bees get their breakfast,

“Eat at Joe’s.”

I didn’t know I would come

but I wanted to.

The snakes undulating all the way

through wildflowers.

- by Matt Daly, Fred Kingwell, Wendy Merrick, Mimi, Sue Mortensen, Carol Schneebeck, and Connie Wieneke

This poem was created at the National Museum of Wildlife Art in conjunction with the “Exquisite Animal” exhibit, which runs through February 5, 2012, at 2820 Rungius Road.

Marilyn’s Sunday Morning

I got up very early and thought that I would write

Of this November dawning while it still was dark as night.

I sat quietly in my leather chair with Sammy at my feet

And Jack, our Weimaraner, looking to me for a treat.

With my journal in my lap and pen gently tapping at my chin

I gazed out of my window and felt gentle darkness peeping in.

A peaceful reverie ensued, my pen dropped to my journal

Jack settled down upon the rug as my mind played with thoughts, eternal.

When next I glanced about me the darkness had turned gray,

And I started thinking strongly of a brisk ride to start my day.

With a last sweep of my pen I finished my latest entry.

Jack ran to the pantry door and stood there like a sentry.

I soon passed out the doggy treats sought by Sam and Jack

Then grabbed Indy and me a bite to eat and left, not looking back.

My horse, Indy, heard me coming and nickered his delight,

Reaching for his carrots as though he had waited for them all night.

A quick brush down and saddle up amid some gentle talk,

Then I jumped into the stirrups and we launched upon our walk.

I looked up at the bright blue sky, smiling back clear as gin;

And felt myself in heaven, as I was riding out – again.

- Harlan E. Finnemore

Harlan E. Finnemore (a.k.a. Old Ug) is a retired engineer who dabbles in poetry while enjoying life in Salmon, Idaho.

Cynical Travel Poem, with Stereotypes

Let’s go to the Canadian wilderness

Paddle canoes across crystalline ripples

See Indians glare and set their traps

Avoid those earthen iron teeth

Watch your step, or else they’ll snap

Or, no, let’s go somewhere different today

How about the famed Oregon Coast?

Getting lost on Portland’s one-way streets

We’ll eat some crunchy Starbuck’s toast

Or see posh artists paint and boast

Okay, maybe not. We’ll try somewhere else

What do you say, somewhere sunny?

Let’s drop down to California’s bays

Watch plastic people soak up the rays

Then smoggy skies might darken the day

I don’t know, what do you think?

They’re all screaming with personality

Some are urban, some are abandoned

And summer time in one,

is like winter in another

So you choose, or I’ll choose the other

- Chantel Roice

Chantel Roice graduated from Journeys School in 2011. She is enrolled at Pacific Northwest College of Art in Portland, OR. Chantel is contemplating a major in English, yet her true love is fine arts.

I Am of the Mountains

I am of the mountains…

            and of the wind

Forged within the embrace

            of the skyward reaching arms

                        of Earth itself.

She is within me…and I am made whole

            in her hands…

She calls to me…and I come unto her

            to be taken in…

To be healed…she fills my

            hollow places

                        with her breath…

And I am saturated with newness…

Made known…known fully

            and revealed…even unto my self…

for I am of the mountains…

They know me…as I am fully known…

            they sing back to me the song

                        that echoes in my soul…

and I am remembered.

- Heidi Ramseur

Heidi Ramseur was born and raised in Jackson Hole, where she trained from a very young age to dance, sing, paint and write her little soul out.  A performing member of Contemporary Dance Wyoming, her passion for art, dance, and music fuels her desire to share with others the joy of creating.  

 

The Rider

A boy told me
if he roller-skated fast enough
his loneliness couldn’t catch up to him,

the best reason I ever heard
for trying to be a champion.

What I wonder tonight
pedaling hard down King William Street
is if it translates to bicycles.

A victory! To leave your loneliness
panting behind you on some street corner
while you float free into a cloud of sudden azaleas,
pink petals that have never felt loneliness,
no matter how slowly they fell.

- by Naomi Shihab Nye

Jackson was fortunate to enjoy a reading from the esteemed poet, Naomi Shihab Nye, on September 19 as part of the Wyoming Humanities Council’s “Civility Matters” project. Among her many honors, she was elected in 2010 to the Board of Chancellors of the Academy of American Poets.

Mountain Time

We are a mountain people,

Great lovers of land and time.

Of seldom trod peaks and valleys,

Of swift rivers under stone,

Of snow slowly freezing to ice.

We are a great tribe of many peoples,

Great lovers of trees and wind,

Of bear and marten, eagle and pika.

We mark our lives by the time of the mountain,

We live and die,

cherish and sorrow,

rise and fall

we become our truest selves,

all on the mountains’ time.

Oh! To be in the moment, to feel the now of hard stone and to breathe the bluest sky-

That is why, we are mountain people,

Living our lives by the mountains’ time.

- Tenley Thompson Bowen

Tenley Thompson Bowen is a wildlife guide and photographer from Jackson, Wyoming.

 

In the Silence

In the silence the marbled moon

Rests blue on the saw tooth silhouette of black pines

Strung along the ridge and diffuses silvered translucence

Across rocky terrain pocked with scattered drifts and clumps of snow.

 Muffled thumping from cloven hooves striking frozen ground interrupts.

I stand, listening in the burning chill of a rising wind,

Straining to discern something recognizable among darkly shadowed trees.

A puff of hot breathe mists in the frigid air at park’s edge.

Indistinct shapes scramble through gray and black lodgepoles,

Becoming a dozen elk, closely bunched, steaming heat. 

They abruptly halt.  One coughs.  Then, another.  

The lead cow, ears forward, listens.

 I can barely see her head turn toward me

When shrill yelps and clipped howls erupt ,

Shattering the calm in a scattered, eerie chorus.

The old cow lunges down slope, leading her throng deeper into the night.

- Terry Roice 

Terry Roice is the Language Arts teacher at Summit High School, where he helps students host various poetry slams and events throughout the year.

 

Running at Night

We ran until our lungs gave out

Yelling at the top of our lungs like sirens passing each other in the field.

Laughing at ourselves and the joy of being irreverent 

And then it hit me

Later

In the quiet cold of a lonely bed 

That I needed to just keep running

And yelling

That I had so much to get out 

That I needed to wail, sob, fall over exhausted and then still utter more

Moaning into the earth and heaving prayers up to the sky

Keeping time with the waves of emotion rolling up from within 

The recognition of my truest self

Of loneliness

Of the soft underbelly of being that never gets exposed

Of the most desperate needing and longing for love and acceptance

- Hatton Littman 

Hatton Littman is a film & video teacher, independent filmmaker, writer, and private tutor in Big Sky, Montana.

Dark-Eyed Junco

 

tickering, skittish

then purling to trees   tiny with trills

hilo de agua…

kew!   indigenous knowledge   pale bluish

or greenish egg   compact

nest of rootlets

Greet me Bees rats

We’ve been called in to the visible world

We’ve been called in

Sombrita

de fieltro

chalice of petals

Two birds are lost in my breast   loose trill

lined with grasses or hair

parallel knowledge

flash in flight   Aire voluto…

And the waves my only treasure

va y va

- Marcia Casey

Marcia Casey lives in Wilson and teaches poetry workshops at C-V Ranch. This poem is a “cento” composed of lines gleaned from field guides, poetry, texts on ethno-ornithology, and first-hand observation.

 

Tidal Locking

We know the trepidation of the spheres

and distances measured in beams.  How near

does each arm of Donne’s compass

reach, like spider filament for a truss,

spinning across a growing galaxy?

We orbit the blackness by degrees,

our stuck faces, like Charon and Pluto

stretched beyond a desperate sostenuto,

searching for how to agree

on our topography.

- Diana Smith

This poem originally appeared in the Spring 2011 volume of the Jackson Hole Review.

Counting Wild Horses

The most efficient way

to count

wild horses

is helicopter flights—the great

speed and whir

of blades in air drives

mustangs from the brush

We count them

three piebald

seven chestnut

two roan

all grey with dust of the plain

Over the low thrum

of the heli comes

the rumble

of hooves black

cracked from shifting rocks

and shale

They gallop towards the ravine

below them, the river

Just when it seems

we will lose them all

they peel from the brink

manes swirling

like plover wings

over salt-damp sand

- Jenny Minniti-Shippey

Jenny Mininiti-Shippey is the managing editor of Poetry International and a professor at San Diego State University. This poem was featured in the Jackson Hole Review, Spring 2011.

 

WiseBark: a Cambium Incantation

WhiteBark Matriarch

Old Growth Patriarch

Enter our Mind Field now

Old Growth Matriarch

WhiteBark Partriarch

Engage our Mind Field now

Like Pelican    Elephant    Whale

            Keepers of the Records of Time

Beings of eternal wisdom

            The WhiteBarks are part of this tribe

With twisting twirl and spiral dance

           What history You have seen

Lacquered in lichen    torched by lightning

           Such eternity links every cell

Perched by birds    scared by fires

           Scratched by claws of great Bear

You awaken within us    lessons remembered

          Constellated in your wise bark core

Entwined           intertwined

          Your sweet nuts caviar for carnivores

Cambrian wisdom       ancient and kind

          Resides in your cambium core

WhiteBark Matriarch

Old Growth Patriarch

Enter our Heart Mind now

Old Growth Matriarch

WhiteBark Partriarch

Engage our Heart Mind now

- Lyn Dalebout


Lyn Dalebout is a poet, educator, sidereal astrologer, and 30+ year resident of Grand Teton National Park. 

Hola Chi-Town

White out – 747 – where’s ole Chicago town?

Big city lights replace double-door saloons

         And a bourbon on the rocks at quarter past noon

         Might ease the pain if I can’t get a room

         Damn this windy city, keep me sane

Bright horizon – 747 – here comes Chicago town

Western buttes meat Eastern ties and suits

         Where high-heels and skirts trump beanies and boots

         Blackberries, laptops, palm pilots and tight wads

         Must be the low elevation, not me that’s odd

Strobe-light ice – 747 – hola chi-town

Show me jazz and show me Wilco, trumpets and overtones

         Not watered-down suburbs, CEO’s and street drones

         The air is as old as the grass is fake

         Why haven’t these robots made the great escape?

O’Hare nightmare – 24/7 – good ole chi-town

Da bears, da bulls, loud talkers spread the news

         Muddy, Buddy and BB are kings of the blues

         If the music doesn’t save me, I’m still amused

         ‘Cause I actually like this city – I’m just weary and bruised 

- Aaron Davis 

Aaron Davis is an award-winning songwriter, journalist, and photographer. His local bands Screen Porch Door and Aaron Davis & The Docks perform regularly in the region.

The Trap

“. . . the way

The night knows itself with the moon.”

-Rumi, The Big Red Book

Nights running my husband set the trap, rammed the Havahart between the chicken coop’s gate, looped the wire as if it, like the hens the fox desired, might tantalize the fox—the one who, like the night, “knows itself with the moon;” as if the fox might forget what it knew and walk into that strange mechanical den. Nights running my husband dreamed the fox into forgetting what it knew of what’s what and what is not: the scent left by fences and houses, the geography shifted by moonlight and cloud, the landscape of shadow where the hay mice snoozed and the hens roosted. Nights running my husband dreamed. But at dawn, while my husband dozed like a god, the trap was tripped by a skunk.

- Connie Wieneke 

Connie Wieneke lives in Wilson, Wyoming.

Dreams

Dreaming is water

It is smooth and clear

It does not need to be open

It only needs the stableness of the spirit

The fruit with a heart

In it the face of dust that unifies the universe

And that becomes many

The light comes, trespassing what is invisible

Believing in what it is, rather what is not

The life within life that carries light

Reality it is not, but real is the essence of been not

Something is born out of nothing

The waking up.

- Gabriel Chapeton

Gabriel Chapeton graduated from Journeys School in 2011. 

The Magpies

I have binoculars out to look at the magpies

resting in the branches of the scrubby pine

outside.  

The snow is melting beyond the window.

A few fallen leaves rattle around in the wind.

A glass sits on the table in front of me.

The water

glows a little in the sunlight.

I raise the lenses, magnifying the birds.

Inside the house, I do not hear the magpies.

Once their young start to fledge,

their cackling in the bushes will disturb

                        my sleep.

The gabbling of their hungry voices

will break the spell cast by the long,

black tail feathers waving iridescent

green and blue,

the violet sheen. 

On this morning

they are silent and wondrous as macaws.

In the grass beyond I see the remains

of a robin’s empty nest decaying

                        on the ground. 

A dead chick

left by the magpies rests on the box

defining the entrance to the house.

                        The season is too young yet

                        to think of planting flowers there.

I will hide the pink flesh, feathers and bones

                        from my son

by casting the carcass under the pine. 

The eyecups of the binoculars cool the skin

                        above my cheeks.

The heft identical to that of the BB gun

I borrowed as a boy when I used to roam

                        the willow-dotted fields

                        hunting magpies.

The copper pellets cracked

against the tangled sticks, silenced the young birds

                        in their nests

The cold of the metal lingers on my face

                        as I sip the water

                        and my ordinary secrets bloom.

- Matt Daly 

Matt Daly teaches in Jackson area schools and throughout Wyoming. He is the Media Coordinator for pARTners.

Crossings

Between forest and field, a threshold 

like stepping from a cathedral into the street—

the quality of air alters, an eclipse lifts,  

boundlessness opens, earth itself retextured 

into weeds where woods once were.

Even planes of motion shift from vertical 

navigation to horizontal quiescence:   

there’s a standing invitation to lie back 

as sky’s unpredictable theater proceeds.  

Suspended in this ephemeral moment 

after leaving a forest, before entering

a field, the nature of reality is revealed. 

- Ravi Shankar 

Ravi Shankar was a visiting faculty member for the 2011 Jackson Hole Writer's Conference. 

A Mountain Lion Makes Ready

The butte in snow is a hand, palm up, to catch
stray bits of sagebrush, ghostly pines, to pass you
to the sky. In preparation, you forsake

the moon, traverse like hunger the high winter
pastures. Everything ascending leaves
its track—a red fox drops a chain of sprig-

sized cups, a snowmobile spits up a long
gnawed ribbon, and the lunging dogs carve
dragon backs—which snow discloses and will hide

in time. Winter is a slow magician, and you
leave little to illusion—willows dangle
your scent like so much ice; the ground nurses

blood of the one-eyed mule; even the shuddering pine
you climb at dawn unfurls gold filaments
over the yelping dogs each time you shift

a haunch. Below, a black creek cuts the world
you rule in two, and the arriving engine whines
like nothing you have heard or killed before.

- Cecily Parks 

Cecily Parks was a visiting faculty member for the 2011 Jackson Hole Writer's Conference. 

Bread Ode

The dough rises whether we punch it or not.
The yeast is meant for scent.

The salt came first.
The wheat is loving the oven.

The body craves its various breads
as it craves stars in summer
or snow in December.

The smells of bread are a beatitude.
The crusts of bread are undulant land.

Even the baker dreams of kneading
and needing, of smelling and

tasting and salting,
of rising under an awning of rain.

- by Laurie Kutchins 

Laurie Kutchins was a visiting faculty member for the 2011 Jackson Hole Writer's Conference. 

Childhood Elegy

If our angels hover above us,

they will see a darkening cornfield, the spectral traces

of lightning bugs, and two brothers

lying among the stalks. 

We come because sometimes it is hard to live.

The cornstalks, limp under the tropical sun,

revive in the cool of twilight.

The angels will know we have been here for hours.

They will land and rest their feathers around us

and whisper soothing names of winged things: finch, monarch,

whippoorwill, ptarmigan, Daedalus, Icarus, Gabriel...

The angels will bend down and touch their faces

onto ours and borrow our eyes: Earlier,

a horse slipped, breaking its leg. 

A boy stood beside his younger brother.

Their father came into the stable, carrying a gun.

Quails flitted out of a bamboo tree; the boy

traced the trail that had led him here,

the field tilled by the dead horse,

where his brother laid down,

dust on his cheeks.    

-  by Joseph O. Legaspi 

Joseph O. Legaspi was a visiting faculty member for the 2011 Jackson Hole Writer's Conference.

Blind

I gaze upon the beauty of this world

Endearing faces, majestic mountains, abundant colors;

Watching humanity flow together.

And nature’s beauty unfurl

Staring into the eyes of one I love,

Truly seeing into their gentle and adoring soul.

And yet, sometimes I wish I was blind

Free from all the slightly prejudices of mankind.

No longer able to see the color of one’s skin

No longer able to judge a book by its cover-

Only to learn and be influenced by the endeavors unseen.

And to avoid the distortion of beauty

That so often is created by our human eyes

And finally be free; living by sound, feeling, touch and smell.

No longer subjected to the seen world

But embraced in the arms of the unseen.

- Michaela Miller 

Michaela Miller is a senior at Jackson Hole High School.

Rhyme

Air an instrument of the tongue,
The tongue an instrument
Of the body, the body
An instrument of spirit,
The spirit a being of the air.

A bird the medium of its song.
A song a world, a containment
Like a hotel room, ready
For us guests who inherit
Our compartment of time there.

In the Cornell box, among
Ephemera as its element,
The preserved bird—a study
In spontaneous elegy, the parrot
Art, mortal in its cornered sphere.

The room a stanza rung
In a laddered filament
Clambered by all the unsteady
Chambered voices that share it,

Each reciting I too was here—

In a room, a rhyme, a song.
In the box, in books: each element
An instrument, the body
Still straining to parrot
The spirit, a being of air.

- Robert Pinsky 

Former U.S. Poet Laureate Robert Pinsky visited Jackson as part of Teton County Library's Page to Podium series.

Bend of Light in A Mountain Meadow

No, not likely, or so she seemed

to imply with a nod. A fritillary

wandered nearby, bounced over a lupine

and became lost in indian paintbrush.

We always departed by passing one another

and settling in another part of a meadow.

Some said they all seemed routine

from a certain distance, but we noticed

subtleties in the bend of light

and settled in different hues.


- Kirk Vandyke 

Kirk Vandyke is an entomologist living in Laramie, Wyoming. This poem originally appeared in the Spring 2011 volume of the Jackson Hole Review.