Mudlake on a Snowy Day

Mudlake on a Snowy Day

Darrel Hammon

This is an old poem that I wrote many years ago about a rabbit drive we participated in.

Jackrabbits bound everywhere.

We drive them like stupid cattle

toward slatted snow fence,

“V” shaped.

It is our duty

Like stripling warriors,

we trudge through sagebrush,

pushing snow with our thick boots.

We shoulder our wood clubs,

carefully notched and carved

for a firm grip

and battle.

From a distance,

the desert begins to come alive.

The jacks streak

like tiny sugar ants,

routed from gummy7 bears.

Ten thousand jacks try to hurdle

our carved sticks

and bundled men astride John Deeres,

El Tigres, and Panthers.

We raise our sticks again and again–

Horsemen on lathered horses,

swing drivers and putters,

yelling, “Fore!”

We banish even cottontails

to fox farms in the east.

Victorious,

we sit on tailgates

like plastic foot soldiers,

sipping hot chocolate,

nibbling maple bars and apple fritters,

and counting coup.

(Timberline, Spring 1993, pp. 7-8)