Today, some of you may be planning a trip to the mountains as part of your Independence Day celebration. If you live in the Sierra Nevada region in California, you could be skiing on the Fourth of July.
Here’s one of the first poems I wrote years ago while taking a creative writing class at the Wyoming Summer School for the Visually Impaired on Casper Mountain. It has since been revised and will appear in the summer print issue of The Avocet. You can click below to hear me read it. I wish you all a safe and happy Fourth of July.
A Piece of Casper Mountain
Gravel crunches beneath our feet.
With plenty of grass, bushes,
a cool mountain summer breeze,
the forest smells of pine
under a blue Wyoming sky.
In the distance, a chain saw shatters the silence.
Is someone clear-cutting or chopping firewood?
As we walk towards camp, the saw stops.
Moments later, a wood-filled truck passes.
Has enough of the forest been taken for one day?
Author Abbie Johnson Taylor
How to Build a Better Mousetrap: Recollections and Reflections of a Family Caregiver
That’s Life: New and Selected Poems
My Ideal Partner: How I Met, Married, and Cared for the Man I Loved Despite Debilitating Odds
Click to hear an audio trailer.
