NOMAD DREAMING

“Look for the helpers” Mister Rogers (1928-2003), Presbyterian minister and American TV children’s programming personality famously counseled. I think. Full disclosure: I’ve never actually watched a Mister Rogers show but cultural icons creep in subtly, then lurk, embedded on the edges of awareness, like the cockroaches when I switch on the kitchen light suddenly at midnight This May Day (mayday mayday) I took some time to acknowledge some of the helpers in my current world,

People forget that eating represents their most profound engagement with the natural world. Through agriculture is how we change the world, more than anything else we do. Michael Pollen in The Omnivore’s Dilemma Agni (digestive fire) inhabits a little patch of garden on the southwestern boundary, under the (recently restrained and reshaped) mesquite tree. The stand of hulless black barley, Hordeum vulgare nudum (it’s not truly hulless, I am discovering) sowed late autumn, smo

When life gives you science fiction rock ‘n roll, listen to Jimi All day a demonic wind has been sandblasting a wildfire invitation, a hot, dry breath from the devil’s own furnace, until, suddenly, at dusk the wind drops. Everything softens into a Jimi Hendrix purple haze. Excuse me while I kiss the sky. Purple haze all in my brain. It’s wrap around liminal light, numinous with a deep quiet, such a softness…shhhh…. Barefoot in the front garden, lured by luminosity, I stalk th

There's perfume burning in the air/Bits of beauty everywhere… Anjani Thomas A brindled blue mystery of an Iris Germanica opened her first bud today on the heels of at least three weeks of purple splendor on all sides. This understated lady was purchased two seasons ago as Coyote Ugly, promising a lush and lovely peach and scarlet dramatic confection. I did get an offer of replacement from the seller when I showed them pictures of who I got, but with no Coyote Ugly available