As the Texas Poet Laureate of 2000, James Hoggard writes beautifully on themes of love, loss, and nature. His unique voice, visual imagery, and carefully crafted syntax take his audience on a journey from Texas to Paris, Taos to Rome, and into their own pasts. Here’s a brief poem titled “Drought” based on his experiences in the stark West Texas landscape. So go ahead and call this place the place that gets no rain because no rain falls here though memories say rains have been here – they’ve swept through ditches, they’ve flooded lawns and drowned roads so we’ve had rains, a lot of rains, and with rain winds strong enough to rip ceiling joists loose and hurl barn roofs away.