(2020)
01
Equinox. I stand on the little bridge over Hover Creek and face north (where the waters come from), then south (where they go). I am without complaint, if not care. Cancer has claimed my spine, my Triassic spine, I call it, for it has been with me forever, like you, my pre-historical friend, my light-bearer, and it is slowly turning to stone. If you join me on the bridge, I’ll show you the tree at the mouth of the creek. From here it looks like a father, waving.
02
The only water
I hear tonight
is the dishwasher
a quiet swirl
not unlike
the ocean
as it churns
its chemistry
and mysteries
of minerals
and glass
Jemisin
writes of the
Stone Eaters
those statue-like
immortal beings
once human
now living stone
who slip
without effort
through rock
mantle and core
to shorelines
on some
distant side
of earth
03
My grandson made up a dance today while kicking a soccer ball back and forth with his father. (Father again!) (Am I channeling mine? Yours? Whose? Why?) The dance was a Ballanchine kind of ballet, all fluid and twirl, then kick! I could have watched my grandson for hours. And he, for his part, couldn’t have been happier if I did. I think perhaps I have never seen anything as beautiful.
04
Where the body
does a dance
the body
kicks out
any margin
of not where
the body
so gorgeous
in these days
where the father
a hound
where the body
a neck
where shoes
and the high arc
of balls
careen into sky
where the songs
where every stone
every relic of life
lies on the couch
and waits
for a signal
a way into
a great
and simple yes
a certain maker
of bones
an arranger
of dusty stems
where grandsons dance
into the clear clean air
and sudden showers
of paint
05
Still, I moved from the sea to these mountains without so much as a sand dollar in my pocket. Do you believe me? My body lost itself along the way. That’s me beneath the moon that looks red but is shadowed by the ash of wildfires. Harvest Moon. Blood Moon. There will be another, a Blue Moon, this Hallows’ Eve, when the veil separating living from dead will be as thin as smoke.
06
I too
am moved
from forests
to these deserts
without so much
as a maple leaf
now turning red
only in my mind
the sea was once
so close
a short drive away
my Atlantic
my watery home
of eagles and gardens
now in this heat
I want to jump
on the bed
seek the hard
ground here
I sit indoors
organizing books
more than I
will ever
look at again
are they
the future
or simply
the act
of putting
things in order
to move the body
into an accounting
a comfort
to know
the books
are close
even those
opened just once
that at any moment
there will be a way
of making sound
of calling
into the air or
studying together
as Ross says
that in there
I might find
a garden
07
I found a garden and there were two children in a fir tree.
I found a garden and there were two finches in a maple tree.
I found a garden and, in the garden, a labyrinth.
I found a garden and a small dog met me at the gate.
I found a garden and God was raking crabapples.
I found a garden and there was a book in a hammock.
I found a garden and, over the gate, a moon.
I found a garden and the garden was dying of beauty.
08
Watching over
your gardens
Baboquivari rises
like a chisel
a great shield
in the dusk
above Sasabe
and the so-called
wall which will soon
be swallowed
like the fools
who once
looked for gold
in these deserts
steel spikes
and false borders
overthrown
by the earth
where once
again jaguars
will wander
freely across
the dirt
and mesquite
bosques
09
My favorite walls are the ones kids build and waves knock down as the tide comes in. Barriers around a sandcastle, that first big one filling the moat with foam. Jersey Shore, Jones Beach, Florida coast. (Places my kids and I have invited destruction.) Not only jaguars, but stingrays and whales and jellyfish. Eventually the sea will rise over walls and roads and skyscrapers to the sands of Arizona, and we will all be plankton, my friend, we will be seastars.
10
I woke up
this morning
and walked
to the couch
as I do
every morning
in the still dark
without my glasses
stopping on
my way
to pick up
my keyboard
my entrance
into a world
that only moments
before I had
left behind
my dreams
still new
and terrifying
as I lay back
on the grey fabric
of the couch against
the red pillows
my fingers on the keys
and saw that
the steel spikes
on the border
had become
a 30-foot gate
in front of
an empty school
a modern building
with abandoned
bare-walled
beige-colored rooms
acoustic tile
on the ceilings
I walked up the stairs
and opened
a wooden door
to step inside
a classroom
with no desks
to find an unmasked man
with a shotgun
looking to shoot
me anyone
who walked
in the door
he did shoot
but he missed
as I backed out
of the room
and ran down
the stairs shouting
go go go
under my breath
to no one
but myself
running as fast
as I could
out the front door
through the spiked gate
into the soft air
of the living room
back to the gray fabric
and the red pillows
on the couch
where I opened
my eyes to
your oceans
the deserts
and the dawn