Back in the desert
on a boulder alone
where the river runs deep year-round
when I was young
between tired piñons
I lay me down.
This place chose only us
sing desert birds
at dusk
in the shadow of cliffs
wind carries downtrail
water sounds.
A pool in the hollow of a stone
holds a handful of rain
holds all the stars
in the night sky listening.
Forgive my slight
implicit bias
for Southern California—
the ones I love
live there
where freeways
span the canyons.
Woodsmoke and wet eucalyptus
in winter months,
Mama Marta
and her eight grown sons
feed us on Spanish
in the afternoons—
La Sirena, El Bandolon.
Tired awake
with where I am,
across the river by night
and through the scrub—
paths we scratched as kids
in shifting sleep I run.
Alas we let our heads explode.
Confusions of children
fully grown
spill forth.
Already the earth unsafe
swarms with thought
sprung complete.
Our volume spent.
We hold no more.
Obliterate the air.
Fit with glass,
well-built into a cliff,
our house
hold us aloft
We who watch
a hawk wing past,
vultures coast
on thermal vents,
let our eyes
descend circular
At dusk the sun slips quick,
great neon lure unaware
the sea swallows whole
Oh well we led the mothers
up trail—
high country
accessible in spring
Slung across our backs now
in canvas envelopes,
six lambs each
folded comically,
head out
to better see
Navigate this steep ravine
down to the flat place
a mother can raise a child safe
In this one life
on this soft-turning earth
of course we carry the fragile ones at first
We’ll lick the cream.
The beater’s engine’s warm.
I need
that picnic knife.
It holds an edge.
Its cracked handle
fits my grip.
Kitchen floor
a chess board upset,
I upend full grocery sacks
on accident.
Heaps more dishes
in a day
than table space—
make room, my heart
falters often
at the brim.
The life I choose
or life I’m given?
Rinse the dust
from the champagne coupes
and let the cat in.
Small moons of glass
sewn into your dancing dress,
lunares enough
to ward off
the evil eye.
Why distrust the frivolous
in this your season
of duress?
Stamping palos in the dust
in generous ribbons of space
you anchor us.
Let us inhabit
your ramble of rooms,
your friends
tune instruments at dusk,
from a tub
you strum guitar,
grand pianos
in the growing dark
where we stand listening—
loose confluence
of song,
almost I think
we could sleep the night through
in this carpeted space, almost
we could live with you, Ragnar Kjartansson.
O Land, long-neglected,
accept this my conscious
attention. Tender grasses
push up endless
but I know you’re meant
for more than these last remnants
of the life you led.
Hours yet of tilling
in my limbs
but I can turn air
and light and rain
into soil, I can feel
we may again begin.
The bathwater until I enter
faintest aqua-tint,
some trace consciousness
of its own
mineral past.
Upthrust through
a fissure
a crack—
rest a minute here,
a visit
we let trail
into air,
a wisp
a curl
of steam