POISON 

From our elevated perch 
the oak below was a swath 

stretching across 
every contour of the canyon.

Intermittent patches of red 
burst through the sprawling terrain 

like a rash, an epidemic.
It’s poison oak, she said.

If we were on the ground,
beneath them,

looking up,
we’d see vines 

climbing the branches, 
higher and higher, 

leaves burning 
their little fires.

Somehow I knew the canyon
was a metaphor

for something else  
that had grown up inside 

the cradle 
of a pandemic.

At the center of what we saw,
a ghost tree,

bare, silver-white—
more metaphor:

the stricken spirit of a thing 
that had lived and died

too quickly, surrounded by 
a growing poison.

DAVID 

Underneath the thickness
of too much thought--

and it may feel like marble,
layers of stone

you have to chisel through--
is the discovery: the figure,

naked and strong,

head cocked,

a knowing look 

in the eye,

poised with slingshot in hand,
ready to make a stand.

Just cut away everything 

that isn't David.

What you'll be left with is

pure listening.

In other words:
Intuition.

OPERA IN THE AFTERNOON

Birdseed

spilling

from the 

feeder.

Finches and

tufted titmouse

fluttering

and chirping

in between

grubbings.

Branches, leaves

gusting

in the aria 

of the wind.

A chime tolling

Amazing Grace.

ON THE TRAIL

a wind coming up 

from the valley

is not a wind 

until it meets hikers

on the ridge, rattles their bones

and one then says:

the wind is

seminal today

in that moment 

air is Wind:

an event 

to be reckoned with

because someone

squalled it was so

THE PROJECTIONIST

The lights dim

in the empty auditorium.

The beam flickers through

the tiny booth window.

The images dance across 

the silver screen.

In a dark cramped corner

the projectionist thinks, Who am I

if there is no one under

the spell I am casting?