One more summer day.
Over the Bay, empty sky —
pale blue. In the Bay,
whitecaps, wind-driven,
do not reach the shore before
giving way to more.
Is there no end to
the blue in your eyes, Toby,
in death and in life?
I stuff my cold hands
deeper into the pockets
of my human coat.
Higher than the birds,
wildfire smoke from the West Coast.
Yet a cold wind sur-
prises me. It’s Fall.
I watch ducks watch a dinghy
put-putting out to
the ocean. The world-
space contains me, pierces me.
Something just let go.
I watch broken bits
of shell rise and fall in the
waves, think of Basho
saying good bye with
a lecture on his ideal:
a sandy bed seen through
a shallow river.
He left them on a litter
in the pouring rain.
I left the West Coast
for Rhode Island. Now the smoke
from western wildfires
dims our feeble sun.
Even our gregarious
ducks say nothing back.
My attention drawn
closer by a butterfly
on the Queen Anne’s Lace,
a break in the clouds,
she tends the border, anon-
ymous volunteer
The marsh grass bronzes
in the warm sun and cold wind.
The human alloy
moves the heart to change.
We are all grass. We pray to
feel the sun and wind.
The elements are
God’s word to flesh that’s open
to the sun, the wind.
The window open
to the chilled September air,
the hush of traffic.
Such I am tonight
under this lamp, a breath
of warm air, ongoing.
White lights then red lights
disappear down the dark road.
I rest in unknowing.
Big fires both sides of
the highway as we drove north
fifty years ago.
Today the West Coast
fires are apocalyptic.
I hunch over in
the wind off the Bay,
the rhythmic hushing of the
waves concentrate the
mind. Words escape me.
Apocalyptic is not
a word but a scream.
Desert my first land-
scape. Tumbleweeds and poppies
shaped the seasons. Snow
on a distant peak.
Now at sea level, I watch
a tired cormorant
soak up Fall sunshine.
Basho was right to find com-
panions everywhere.
Darker earlier.
I let the tea steep longer,
sip it more slowly.
Between now and dawn
books, memories, and more books.
Memories of books.
The bad infinite.
I turn your picture to the
wall. You make good dreams.
