JUST BENEATH THE MOUNTAINS

     -for Larry,my father

There’s a farm carved from wilderness

by a man who called himself a pioneer.

It only exists now the way I remember-

Angus cattle dotted the grassy hillsides

and walked to the salt lick at sundown.

Purple martins swooped to catch supper

doing us a favor, eating those mosquitoes.

Laughing children darted through rows of

bushy tomato plants in a forty acre field

on noisy four wheelers and mini bikes.

Horses smiled like people and hung their

well groomed manes and heads over the

rails painted in distinct John Deere green.

And when I drove up, he’d be seated on

the front porch admiring the mountains.

Sometimes he’d be watering his flowers

on the driveway beyond the metal gates.

Once, I found him with arms folded and  

leaning back in a beat up chair waiting by

the tack room with a grin of contentment.