As i stood
under the moon’s and stars’ and planets’ light,
i checked my watch,
but felt distant from
the time of day,
or time at all.
For i connected to these outlying rocks
not as lights in the skies,
but distant eternities
outlasting i.

A cold, dark desert begins
When a faint peach light saunters over the horizon
& climbs the sky,
Leaving darkness to shadows and graves.

The chaffed branches of bushels,
Barely lingering along the threshold of life,
Find solace in crawling growth
As the glow reaches dusty twigs,
Making them as networks of smoker bronchi.

Faded green cacti hold posture sharp,
As totems of harsh-landed culture,
Serving as solemn landmarks
In a flatland of mixed dust and rock,
They stand tall
All for a breath of young desert air.

While quiet hue spreads,
Passing each towering rock & mountain,
Even quivering lizards,
Waiting to be sunbaked,
Change to pink-yellow glow
& scarcely move
As the sun soars above
sizzling rigid scales,
Until the glowing horizon becomes a burning, lit land
Under a radiating Arizona sun.

Though callused and bruised they are,
My bare feet gently graze
Silk leaves of grass,
As foot by foot
Takes stride by stride
& gingerly brushes over every blade.

I’m no preaching bishop,
Nor crying martyr,
But I pray
The joy of walking barefoot
On a lively green horizon
Is never forgot.

it’s the roar
of airplanes,
littering the sky,
that silences
a bird's song.

The sun slightly bleaches wood buildings
For California heat burns mild,
But the cheer it brings to folk of this street
Makes it worth the hills burning wild.

Dressed like an old man
At a bar of a dulcet past,
To find thoughts of silk shirts and drinks
That make expensive nights last.

I walked along the bay shore
Lined with tiny shops and eateries,
To look through cracks between buildings
And see riches of wealthy free.

Each shop and wood wall café
That lined the bulbous-rocked beach
Has little more than caviar and wine
For the affluent that saunter the streets.

I never knew a dreary rook
whose trill is absent from my ear.
A crow ashamed of its black
that brushes wet paint to change its color.
A bird that builds nests from razors and plastic
who abandons forests for streets
and brothers for cold nights.

Perhaps it did not survive.
Perchance it dove into the ocean
to find eternity within its form.

A melancholy avian was not meant for this world,
for no other song is fit to fill the morning’s air.

The other day at the zoo,
i stood in front of the lions’ den,
taking pity upon a
Life in a cage.

Then a lion stood
from the shade of a eucalyptus tree
and approached me with
Pride in his walk.
The king of animals looked
in my eyes and said
“Someday, I will free you.”