Step outside from the cool
and feel a heaviness
to the desert air,
a rare bit of moisture
that brings out scents
of pine and sage
and garden flowers.

White cloud tops billow
high into the blue,
shades of grey underneath,
but no sheets of rain yet fall
against distant brown hills,
no jagged light cracks
like a whip
across the eggshell sky.

At the park I stop to sit
beneath a pine tree.
Three crows glide in,
land in the branches above
cawing noisily,
peering black eyed down
through olive needles
and prickly cones.

No breeze tickles
skin or sways grass
as the clouds darken
and swell.

And I wait.

And the crows wait.

And the desert,
finally,
outwaits us all.