Page 15 - Oasis in the Sky

Mountains and More...

I grew up on a ranch in the mountains of Southeast Arizona. Yes, there are
mountains in Southeast Arizona; they are the last vestiges of the Rockies. The
Coronado National Forest was my backyard. How many kids are blessed with
a national forest for a backyard? When I stepped out my back door and looked
up, I saw majestic granite cliffs and forest, lots of forest.
I lived there from the time I was two years old until I was fourteen. After
moving to West Texas with my mother, I spent my summers back in Arizona.
The mountains and the events of my life that transpired there, are a major part
of who I am, for in my youth, I spent much of my time traipsing around the
Huachuca Mountains. Huachuca is Apache for thunder, so I grew up in the
“thunder mountains,” and they are named that for a very good reason, which I
explain in my poem, “Monsoon Dragons.”
While my home was in the mountains, all my friends lived in the high desert
below the mountains, so I spent much of my time in the desert as well. There
was always this transition from desert to mountains on my return home.
I remember the first time I crested Miller Peak, the highest peak in the
Huachuca mountain range. I was a teenager, and I was hiking alone, as usual,
and I recall the feelings and emotions of summitting that peak as if it happened
yesterday. What I experienced there and those memories are indelibly imprinted
on my heart and mind, and have become the inspiration for the title of this book
and its first poem, “Oasis in the Sky.”

Foothills of the Huachuca Mountains of Southeast Arizona

1
Oasis in the Sky
Oasis in the Sky