Night Bloom

The table feels empty

Despite heaps of food.

I am hungry for the wrong things.

A cereus bloomed last night

But I did not see it.

One night of the year

 Luminous velvet edges

Spring from a neck

Of spines and gnarled

Armor.

I walked past it

Breathing hard

Lungs straining against

A straitjacket

Woven from the hunger

For more than I could ever use.

Lightning struck the roof

Frying our habits.

Phones died.

Tools are silent, inert.

I am angry at being set free.

I am sure I need them

To slake my appetite

For something to fill

Empty places.

In the silence sprouts a question:

For what are you hungry?

Fog clears

And I see with right eyes

Roots of thick appetite

Rising to

Stems, fruit

A ripening

Seed,

Liquid, timeless

Desire. 

I want to witness
The night bloom of the cereus
And sit with it as the night gives way to day
As the sun exposes the blossom,
Piercing its defiant glory.

I want to attend to the bloom as it
wilts, kneels, fades, drains,
And prays to the ground.
I want to abide with the cereus
To call it by its sacred name,
wonder.

I long to gaze directly at this
reminder
Of the brevity and passing
impermanence
Of me,
And all things,
To turn away from neither
The beauty and miracle of the bloom nor
The certainty of its demise.

I hear the spines of the cacti
Whispering in my dreams.
Withered and thirsty in this
Place bathed in light
They remember.

The Lines Are Down

My computer is locked

And won’t give me the

Time of day

Literally.

If I don’t press

Control-Alt-Delete

I will remain exiled from the

Land of cyber surfing

Of dry electrons

Running like

Milk and honey

Ozone manna

Silicone processed

Heroin.

Do it.

The hungry ghosts

Say.

We don’t like it here

In this

Dangerous world

Of bumper cars

And broken hearts.

When the Waters Recede in Tucson

            It is Sunday night in our little mesquite bosque. I grab a key lime soda from the fridge and find a chair on the porch next to Megan. We can hear the highway up the hill behind the house but the light of the setting sun and the breeze off the mountains – a breeze still carrying the chill of last night’s snow – quiets the drone of traffic.

No gauzy film, billboard, corporate-sponsored dreamscape, or media hype could capture this subtle shift of the season, this last, cool, goodbye kiss of springtime that spills over and through us as we sip drinks and make small talk.

Snowbirds, busy packing, worry what summer will do to the garden, hastily apply lip-gloss, and stow golf carts. More of the desert will be given to them next year, more water too. The lock snaps shut on the hasp. Doors close. Engines whine, then fade into the distance.

            The last of the snow runoff is withdrawing back to the high country. Clear water still runs over the sand at the foot of the mountains, but has disappeared just today here in the valley. I followed it upstream as the mouth of our winter creek retreated, growing silent, its piece said, overtaken by the thirsty sand.

            Shadows lengthen. Trees have gone opaque with blossom and leaf in this last week. I watch my wife read, study her crossed legs, and wonder how many times I will see her again in a light like this, a breeze like this, my shoes wet with the last drops of a vanishing desert river. Once more? Twice? Not more than a few, if any.

            The shadows overtake the light, and the sounds of the highway come down to us, no longer held at bay by the breeze. She gets up. It is too dark to read, and friends are coming over. I sit and listen for the sounds of coyotes, somewhere.

A Tribute to Will Streeter*

Will Streeter aint no

wall streeter

He’s more flannel shirts

And cross country marathons

Than pin stripes and

Bottom lines.

No, Will Streeter aint no

wall streeter

His accounts are measured in

The currency of giving

And listening

His one good eye

Fixed on breathing and heartbeat

The other on

A moon eternally full. 

Tides rise and fall

But the ocean remains.

Not that he minds

The earthly pleasures of

A cold beer

Or a smooth spinning

Wheel

Or a tailwind

Once in a while.

But he’s more interested in

Quieting the distracting

Demons within

Being a brother’s keeper

Finding soul in sidewalk cracks

Driving nails.

No, Will Streeter

Aint no wall streeter

He slips fifty dollars into an

Envelope

To be found when

He is gone.

He’s builds his Beloved a shelter

When another man would glide

To a weekend off

Harvesting forgettable ephemera.

Will does what needs to be done when others

Do what they wanna do

No matter the cost.

It’s easy to overlook a Will Streeter

Who runs under the radar

Beholding, abiding, teachable

Collecting wisdom from

Those who traveled his path

Before him

A little scary to behold a man

So alive he embarrasses

My time squandered

Weighing the merits of which

Gewgaw or widget I should

Stack in my closet.

Not that he thinks the worse

Of that

Because Will Streeter

Takes charge of himself

Is beholden to his conscience

Spoken in father tongue

Gathering a gold that

A wall streeter fails to see.

Years

Sawdust swirls around us

Like January snow

As the chain snarls

Its way through

Blow-down pine

The muffler’s hot breath

Melts a golden bead of sap

That drips onto the singing

Blade as it chews through

Decades.

Rings mark the swings

Of seasons

The cutting reveals

Years

Infused with memory

Running backwards

The night on a Mexican bus

When I took your hand.

Through the year I found you

And loved you on this

Mountain

Moon, silken thighs

A lion wailed below us

In the canyon.

When we cut the pieces

To fireplace size

You hold the squirrely

Log by broken branch pegs

Like the forelock of a goat

Locked in place

By the second hand

That passes noon

Your hands are small in my gloves

Inches from the hungry teeth

As they devour again and again

Your eyes still bright

If set in wrinkles

Now winter

Years rise up the chimney

Carried away by the dutiful wind.

Lunacy

The moon had something to say

Last night.

Its light tapped me on the shoulder.

And I turned to see its

Beaming and benevolent

Face

Full and a bit proud

For having grown so bright

Again.

I listened and heard

A low light

Whisper.

Stay awake with me

Tonight.

And shed the

Unnecessary weight

Of your life.

Pile it high by the road

For those who need things

To be happy.

Then wander the arroyos

Until your leanness

Sings to me

I who take your heart

Without mercy.

That is the way of beauty

She says

For those who turn to listen to

The moon.