invocation

let this morning’s hour

slip to dawn the way

a white dove

slides from her sill

and fades with the light

should I be this happy

the way darkness, having

perched on a waning moon

then swoops

under stars, filling

her breast with songs        

could it be so—

      —this way

words caught on thorns;

you told me once

after all those years

that you understood why

and yet, I have still

so many words      to say

              could it be—

   —that way

answers burrow

like the black-specked cactus wren

into spiny necks of velvet

saguaros trembling with

each day’s pulse

they long for midnight blooms

to quench this—

our parched land

yet there, by the hushed

waterside

a gossamer-dressed heron

turns her regal head

and peers into the arid

parts of me, places

I cannot reach and why

do I still try

   now that dusk has arrived—

dust swirls under

the galloping

hooves of memory

spurred by pain;

a frenzied flock of devils underfoot

exalting psalms

to the dim lit sky

turning, turning in the spire

and longing—

                                  —as I do

for plump fruit-flesh

soaked in the salted brine of time

    could I be, here

in this place with you

              and never lie—

the blood moon’s

haunting call, the banished

sunset’s eternal cry

knowing      we could never leave—

                   no matter how hard we try