your Colorado village was freezing,
even the eve of May

the bus dropped me there
you weren't waiting

I toted my duffel bag, now turned sixty,
to your place

you didn't answer for an hour; when you did,
it was not sleep in your eyes

we didn't fight--it was too cold in your apartment
for heated arguments

you didn't bother to say you were busy, or forgot
your father's only son had agreed to this visit

you had only stale bread, stingy swirls of peanut butter
in a cold jar

you left with a promise to get food,
and my last seven dollars

I waited for you until dusk, then dragged my bag
to a locked church

I put an extra ancient sweater under my coat, leaned
against the chapel's small west wall

I watched the sky turn from mauve to black,
until I fell asleep

and dreamed of a time I carried you on my shoulders,
under a warm sun

Blackberry blossom and glorious Honeysuckle vine
Dark green Ferns and scented Loblolly Pines ...
Brush , briar thickets reducing visibility to arms reach
An Ole grey Opossum high atop a Cottonwood Tree ..
Thick floors of pine needles and knee high wild grasses
Yellow Locust , green grasshoppers flying in advance on stair -step hillsides leading into chilly Walnut Creek ...
Sandbars filled with quartz and mica , glistening between the 'Brick red clay cliffs' as far as you can see downstream ..
Painted turtles and Blue Herons , Cottonmouths and Black Racers ..
The music of life at every turn , every ripple of water , swaying River Birch ..