"Desert Notes," "Rainforest," and "January"

Desert Notes

Dark clouds gather. Junipers
begin to rustle. The moon bathes
the canyon in a soft glow.

In my tent,
I try to read. I try to sleep.

Winds shake me awake –
I am no longer sure of what I hear.

Logs crashing? Rocks falling?

Wild animals lurking –
a coyote, a cougar, a bear?

The wash flooding
the blossoms of spring?

Rainforest

I don’t remember how
we got here, at the end of a road
to a rainforest.

Lianas hang from branches
over the wet earth and monkeys
swing from the vines.

I know what you wanted.

I did not love you, not
in the way we are taught to think
of love, but

you held me, listened to me, made me
say what I needed.

You let me say what I wanted.

January

Geese gather on the lake, on the border
of water and ice. I walk on the shore,
watch the birds waddle and lift their wings
as if they wanted to fly. They swim
in a blue like the blue of the sky, feeding
on grasses, maybe a minnow. The sun
casts its last rays on the mountains beyond
the city, where the snow is on the verge
of breaking – and I keep thinking, bearing
witness is the deepest form of love.