The Unbridled Mirror
Painted Plains Horse
The Unbridled Mirror
The wild horse herd isn't just an external issue—it is a mirror reflecting how modern humans treat their own wildness, freedom, and rest.
I have a memory from my teen years walking down from Battle Mountain in Nevada on Highway 305, after our car broke down in the camping area. Wintertime no one anywhere. That crystal clear sky after a dusting of snow the night before.
Sagebrush on the wind and far in the distance wild horses running somewhere.
Finally a rancher picked us up and we drove into town and got a tow-truck. This was pre-cell phone, a time that is going to look like the golden age soon. A timespace when the world was not bumping into each other save on the dance floor.
The Wild Horses.
The Year Of The Horse ~ THE GRAND DUKE
A Time To Show Reverence for the Horse as a symbol of nobility and momentum, a time when honoring the horse elevates human dignity as well.
I look to take no side in writing this. I’m finding that the witness or observer place works best. Information is fluid so change is part of life.
I can’t write this and villainize the field agents or bureaucrats. I have to treat culling as the logical byproduct of an outdated, transactional worldview—an administrative system simply following spreadsheets because it hasn't remembered how to honor the living world.
The people executing these orders are often caught in complex bureaucratic webs, economic pressures, or rigid protocols, I do see that and I extend empathy across the entire spectrum.
"Look at what we do when we forget reverence, and see how much richer our relationship with the land becomes when we remember it."
‘When we look out across the sagebrush at these creatures, we are not looking at a resource problem to be calculated on a spreadsheet; we are standing before the unbridled mirror..."
I like most people am in awe of horses. I am especially keen and have a big heart for ranchers and people who care for horses. It’s even more than a full time job and requires many people, but look at the majesty of these creatures so big and quite touchy at times I must say.
I had two great horse experiences, one in the wilds outside of Hollister, California riding with my fathers friend who broke horses for a ranch. His horses were easy to ride he was stern yet very loving towards them.
The next was an afternoon riding the hills of Marin county when we came upon a huge pond. We took off the saddles, rode bareback and the horses happily plunged into the water. Everyone was wet and happy, when I slipped off in the water my horse waited kindly for me to get back on. Great day.
The Great Plains. Wild Horses roaming free. It’s moving, it stirs the soul.
The Mustang.
When humanity attempts to strip sovereignty from the land, we lose our own sense of nobility, business does not need nobility humans do and now so do Horses.
How do we move from eradication and management toward co-existence and stewardship not only of the land and Horses but with Water and Agriculture too.
Simple Common Sense - seems stupid to have to say it aloud but believe me we as a culture have drifted away from Simple Common Sense.
Profits cause the drift. I’m in the publishing business. I get it, I’ve drifted too. But this is me reminding myself and you we need to do more as stewards of the land we live on and the creatures that inhabit it.
The Year Of The Fire Horse and the west is on fire and the Horses are being culled.
I love the Wild West
I love that image because I am that image.
I had to travel East to discover the Wild West from San Francisco to Santa Fe then to Scottsdale, so now I know - The Great Wide Open, Horses Roaming Free.
"To look upon the herd is not to see a conflict of policy, but to remember who we are when we step outside the cage of our own making. Some truths are too noble to be managed out of existence—they simply ask us to stand still, hold reverence, and refuse to turn away.
'Wild horses couldn't drag me away...''Wild horses couldn't drag me away.'" Rolling Stones
Nicholas Vitale
San Francisco August 2026