fuel cells

Watch the meaning of "fuel cell" change from this:


to this:


language
changes us
as we devolve
knowledge of nature
to the molecular engineer
and their ponzi schemed patent chasers
dependent on our mass ignorance
of natures sweet uncombustable pleasures

the muse reading up on more practical stuff

The Olden Days Girl

wind runs right up this olden days girl
bulked up in layers against the February cold
chickens follow her to the calling cows
waiting out the bales fall and bust
and a fair green distribution
the girl and the dog check the state of calves
note the foo foos of the cows still in calf
pray that the water hasn`t froze up
and only then return as a flock to the sheds
mully high headed, tail a sail
ahead and center
her flock coming down the drive
into the workshop
where tools and bolts, implements and jobs are strewn
their histories cloaked by chicken dusted grime
dulled by the passage of an indefinite time
durations measured by the hatching of bantees
the progress of spider webs and the thickness of dust

my neighbours corn field

six inches of snow and near the end of November
across the road from my garden the transgenic corn still stands
its sodden and lodging, heads dropping, kernels covered in muddy snow
the odd shotgun blast but no pheasants alight, no disgruntled crows
deer are feeding elsewhere
what of it? who cares? let it rot or sprout come spring
the crows are feasting on the slim pickings on the surface of my compost
squawking and scratching for the buried scraps
and I want to know: where are the deer?

svalbard

In the icy reaches of the polar cap
where peaks push through ancient glacial blue
pyramidal mountains and ridged back bone
ions spinning down magnetic lines
there are goings on below the dancing light where heaven meets the earth

a silent world a white lacy gown, broken by scars of russian mines
and roads to labs with scientists and screens
assessing the numbers and values of bending the firmament:
the ionosphere coupled with the magnetosphere coupled with govern-free fear
plus vicious bears and frigid cold, it is no where better viewed than here
like haarp, eiscat beams up into the airy tissue an electron pulse
to block the double helix flow that travel down the magnetic line

And on a back road behind the airport, a sentry stands guard under fiber-optic art a laser knife in the mountain's base and under it a door
leading to alloy ribbed tunnels leading to vaults funded by Pharaohs:
the planet's seed resource tucked in nanoplastic
for our children's children's children under the dancing light


(photo from here)

chicken in corn

The little chicken in the corn rummaging through the autumn leftover garden, the frost not arrived quite yet so there are a few self-starters: arugula and cilantro bolted so tender but too small for the poor farmer

The eyes of my sister have seen many things that I too have seen
there is an easiness in our company because of what we have shared in our vision
it doesn't matter that our worlds look different now
and our bodies and our skin
our eyes shine with wonder still at a stone, or the water
as when we were just wee

Bringing Home the Cows

They have been out on the new grass, on their new farm, our new farm, for 3 hours now. No kicking or jumping; no soujourn across the river. They have inspected the perimeter and the vegetation a few times, stopping for the clover and delighting in the giant plantain. But its the enclosure's feel and their absent herd uppermost on their minds: noses pointed bang-on every revolution of the fence as they reach the closest point to their old home. A quick but gentle touch of the wire on the nose: I see her test the the fence. It’s between zaps, that big brown one I call Curls backs up, ears back, contemplates a jump, but goes back to the clover.
Five hours later and its pouring. The buckwheat in a plot beside the pasture bobs and tosses with the lovely onslaught. The cows are laying down and it some effort to find them in the long June grass. Relief that they are there hiding chewing their cuds in a warm hollow.
Once alerted they are up, all ears .
“You. drenched cows” their furry hides flat and dripping. “Come into the barn please. This is home now don't cha think”. All three of us wonder this now. Home is it?
A slow saunter behind them doesn’t hint them toward the building. No sense stressing them. Cows are for rain. The barn is empty except for the tractor and a couple of feed tubs. There is manure and soggy bedding from the last 2 days of the cows confinement in the tractor’s bucket and fresh sweet hay in the wide stalls to entice them back in. The barn is dripping from where the cupola once hailed. It is one of many projects to do. To keep me busy so my nose won't point toward my old herd.
Seven hours later and it is dark and a glich is observed in a corner post where a hosepipe and wire had been jimmied when the expensive corner insulators had run out. The pulse is audible along with its dramatic spark. Without thinking my hand is on the wooden post and is shot through from palm to hip, my injured hip. My body lights up the grass infront of me and I lay there in the wet. My hip is remarkably released. I turn off the electric fencer and run to the glich, screw in an insulator, fasten the electric tape and tighten up the line. Later, tromping through the long grass with a flashlight looking for my new cows, I come across their pathes etched through the pasture and find them lying faithfully on the furthest western point, noses pointed to their old herd

At the Bituminious Sands

The Hydrocracker is a complex bye
A lightening bolt in his oily eye
An ace and a joker where his sleeve used to be
does his part so the oil flows free

Now the erector is a real built rod
with 2 big cranes to help lift his job
with glintin steel to a sphincter's stump
o the prize is the smokestack from the humpty dump

The gasifier makes it fit
for the marketplace and its consumption bit
skies of tar soot and lakes oozed crap
keep the black gold flowing through the nafta tap

The Newfies and the Natives and the farmers and the tramps
Who shed their lives and come to camps
heres hoping the union will check the greeds
of the corporate bosses from which we draw our needs

Drug tested, IDed, searched and kept in pods
we're here to work we'll do our jobs
until the beast crumples and we are homeward bound
see it eat itself from office towers to the oily ground

This Old Farm

This old farm has had many names
clues about them plow up from time to time
lives like etchings on a ball and chain
they broke free to the road or rail line

broke free nine to five and the city life
broke free to a nursing home
to a life of crime or pleasure
or a new and better farm

big ole freight train stops and sits for awhile
empty box car eye balls me
I can see myself just slipping away
to a place where its not work that sets me free

But I drop the plow and carry on down
these ribbons of deep black soil
I break the earth and she breaks me
and I guess I won't be going away today