By Richard R. Cuyler, Salida CO
The goddamn pigweed’s sprouting everywhere!
I’ve pulled and pulled and pulled and still there’s more.
They’re even more invasive than before
despite deracinations just last year.
Richard R. Cuyler
Spring Cleaning
By Richard R. Cuyler, Salida, Colorado
March and Mountain Bluebirds and nest boxes
with last year’s residue of white and down
and grass. I open one and she commands
the other, the cocked head saying it’s her own.
My Mount Princeton
By Richard R. Cuyler
Up close, Mount Princeton is an ugly pile of granite; from a distance, it is beautiful in all its changeability of weather and seasons.
At 71, should I have known better? Six of us, Princeton University alumni and friends, gathered for the annual climb up “our” eponymous mountain. Since it was mid-August, I dressed in my usual eastern gear: shorts, T-shirt and hiking boots, with a fleece pullover and a poncho for good measure. We met in a drizzle, so out came the poncho. I was chilly, but why break out the fleece when the climb would soon warm me up? Our late start didn’t concern me. I knew about the furious afternoon storms but thought they couldn’t happen on an overcast day, since heat wouldn’t build up, a condition I understood as necessary.
First the road, then the trailhead, then the short stretch of tundra before the boulders, interrupted occasionally by sections of rough trail. I could tell the air had become thinner, but the light rain had stopped. I was warm and content. Although I had to stop frequently to catch my breath, I was exhilarated. Sometimes I could hear water purling through the jumble far below my feet. Everything, including my knees, was right with the world.