Two Poems
From Here, There
Latitude 41.115791, Longitude -112.4768287, Elevation 1270 m
This is the salty basin seen from space,
what you know of from a work
of art – those rocks arranged,
that land
displaced
all for the spiral, that whorl
of the hurricane, the crozier
or fiddlehead mute on the forest floor.
That which can be viewed, can be
walked upon so much more now
that this vanishing
is taking place.
This desiccation,
retraction, like that shy plant that curls
inward when touched.
The leaves there
and then not.
Talk of houses and the pasture, water
needed for the corn
and the alfalfa give us cause.
Not just because, that response
you tried to use as a girl
and were told, No, because
is a conjunction and nothing more.
If you take from here, this
there, will feel it: ripples
on the pond from the stone you flung.
Salt on the skin after running.
Salt on the wrist behind the band shell,
when he claimed everyone,
everyone must drink tequila once.
You tossed the bright green limes
into the bright green grass.
Salt rimming the shore,
white as snow, snow
of that season that goes
the way of and returns.
• • •
Where Once a Field and a House, Now
Latitude 67.8783435 Longitude 44.1529957 Elevation -32768 m
Silt and seaweed scraped clean
away and the waves move more so,
move in their unencumbered way.
So, where once the pasture, now a dune
to climb and a door left ajar
for the sandy hillock.
From the second floor, a desert
view and sea beyond. Dreams of
camels plodding one and one and one.
In a bowl, berries
like apples. Their tang
and amber hue.
All the shoes
with shore gathering. That soft tread
some love in spite of.
For: the asphalt
is unyielding, and, here, calm
and the buried skull.