TWO POEMS
We know it like a cloak uplifted,
revealing miles of almost anything
alive. Hidden insects feed and breed
on the border for birds and reptiles
ambushing one another to be a meal
for clever mammals – a tapestry
of comings and goings woven
into thickets and openings of wild
oats and fox tail cut by canyons
and creeks, centered in the summer
by waterholes. Here we are insulated
from a crazy world, the reckless
and insane savers of time, collectors
of seconds and minutes to spend
at the end of their strings.
SUMMER NATURE
The hills could be an empty-headed blond
or brown – lifeless and slick as ceramic
beneath the blaze that bakes our clay.
Or golden with patches of north-slope oaks
strung like meadows into the long, green
canopy of sycamores down the creek
to the Kaweah below the dam where
cattle find shade with reliable breezes
between grazing the half-light of dusk
and dawn, when each contrast seems
slow to change its expression, unhurried
in the broken light to dress and undress
away from the heat. Wild and domestic
dancing naked, making livings early and late –
depending on your summer nature.