Editor’s note: In a sad coincidence, the Herald received an email the morning this poem was published that Joel Fallon had passed away the previous morning at the age of 85. As Benicia’s first poet laureate, Joel established a lot of programs that have allowed poetry to thrive in our community, including this Sunday’s Poets’ […]
Poetry Corner: “Old Images” by Joel Fallon
How cumbersome the camera was, the tripod too and box of plates. The fuss to get the light just so, to make the whole thing straight and true was almost more than they could stand. Important too that everyone be still, not thrash or mill about. Regardless, trees moved in the wind and water flowed […]
Is this really adios?
WHAT AM I MISSING HERE? Are Benicians just kittens in a burlap sack, down by the riverside, resigned to the inevitable? Let’s see if I’ve got this right. (a) We’re in earthquake country (see evidence of the Green Valley fault in terrain on the way to Cordelia); (b) We’re next to fragile wetlands (for spectacular […]
Joel Fallon: The Gold Rush and the Oil Rush, a sad parallel
BY THE 1850s, IT HAD BECOME INCREASINGLY DIFFICULT FOR SMALL-SCALE MINERS to find and profitably extract gold from California’s gold country. That’s when big-time operators moved in with hydraulic technology. Sediment, washed away by their high-pressure hoses, dammed or clogged riverbeds and lakes. Rivers’ courses changed. Agriculture was threatened in the Central Valley. Conflicts over […]