Birds and desert

Day and Night

 

Woodpecker knocking on the doors of fate

 

or against the siding

to a house that floats on good luck

and bad

while a hummingbird drinks from the light.

Tap, tap, tap, who’s there? Tap, tap, tap,

 

will it rain? Tap, tap, tap, do the numbers

that count money

count the bees?

What

 

does a roadrunner cost? is an oriole worth more

than a thrasher? tap, tap, tap,

are starlings no more

than small change? Why are there people

 

asleep on the street? Is a shopping cart a home?

Grubs in the tree bark,

insects in the walls, honey in the desert,

 

stars in the world beyond traffic

and street lights, beyond language, beyond zip codes,

where no password exists

to grant entry to night.

The owl’s calls say

 

go to the outskirts of knowledge

when the song the world is singing

 

goes out, out, out of tune.

Desert’s Way

 

Cactus wren calling, thrasher in the thorns,

sunlight parts

to let the sparrows through.

It’s a slow path out of springtime

where the fishhook cactus offers purple

flowers and the earth

inside the earth

a patch of shade.

                                 No language spoken here,

just the crunch

a footstep makes and the chorus

of wingbeat and song from down among

the mesquite tangles

and stones

                      that fell from the stars.

Every hummingbird glows

with its own creation story. They have flown

through rainbows to be here,

broken out of the underworld

and even in

                       their realm of flowers

they live as fiercely as the warriors

whose souls they once accompanied

on their passage to the sun.

Migration Dream

 

Ninety-eight degrees and a grosbeak

looking in the back window; nine AM with no way back

from dreaming when the solid world

alights on a branch so slender

it bends to the will

of the sun. A scene directly from

 

the spirit world: a mixed flock

leaving mountains behind

gracefully scattered, grouped in such

variety the light could not identify them,

they winged with dusk

in sight and pulled a tree

uprooted, branches held by beaks,

with majesty across the sky.

Waking on the flyway,

 

migration beginning, waiting

for monsoon thunder

while daily highs climb from

seeing to distraction and

the orange flash of one

bird among the many

on their way

pulling sunshine up by the roots.

 

The Cats

 

The cats don’t know there’s trouble

in the world. Their job is to look graceful

in disturbing times. The golden hour

is upon us, late light streaming

from the mountain ridge

and a chill in the air.

                                To lick their paws

in sympathy with those

who sleep on the streets, to stretch against

the window surrounded by an outdoor glow.

No borders for them, they open every cupboard

and occupy the highest places

they can reach.

                       Dreams flow

through their limbs while they sleep.

Nothing earthly matters

then, it’s a world of fish and backyard doves

in there. Elections never happened,

the pursuit of happiness translates

into Spanish, to carry concealed

means a mind full of ideas.

                                           Just look

at how the more mature one occupies

a chair with regal demeanor, how the younger

one has all his outlaw spirit

still intact. The desert winter

sharpens itself under moonlight. They curl

into the moment and obey nature’s order

to serve the gods of elegance and sleep without pity.

Spiritrunner

 

Another day begins to sag

and suddenly

he’s here, looking both ways on the run and happy

as sunlight soaking into

early summer.

                         The Zuni see him

bringing rain, the Maya knew he gave his brightest

plumage to the quetzal, to Mexico

he brings the good luck America

would deny. His footprints in the dust

lead away from evil.

                                    He’s earthy, sacred,

draws latent thoughts from hiding

and makes them run, run, run

so fast no witches

can keep up. Two twenty-eight in the afternoon,

he’s a backyard spirit

                                       chasing memories away

to make space for living now.

He’s patient, fast,

won’t give up and has a sense of humor to strip

unworthy presidents of

their hubris.

                     Many mornings

he parts the feathers on his back to let

the daylight warm him. On the stony front yard

beside the ocotillo his presence is divine

on humble ground

until he runs

                       where even spirits

have to hunt. And with a good day’s life accomplished

he returns to dream

the feathered dream of those

who are beautiful and yet uninterested

in superficiality. No boasts,

                                                   no falsehoods, nobody

to deceive, just the modest reassurance that come

storms he can outrun them and carry

shreds of lightning

in his beak.

Night Flight

 

Two hours of the year to go

and one step from the back door into darkness.

Quiet except

                      for trial fireworks as the mountain

counts down. Time on a tightrope.

Across the wash a few windows

still awake and streetlamps on their toes

straining for a view into the future.

There’s an owl

                           perching in the yard

and when her moment comes

she flies at barely shoulder height,

dipping first then rising,

on the way

                   to where spirits meet

with a wingspan twelve months wide.