Horses 

otherwise somber

in their graying

a slipper for someone

sleeping on the broad back

snaring the growing quiet —

corralled wild

horses

the pink roses

of the desert spring

drinking

and covering the ground,

forcing an appearance of carpet 

and the way concrete streams

gather under our feet.

A hand crimped by its bones

drags the snuffling head

to the slope of the sidewalk —

heads will roll. 

She’s disordered — 

an eye clumped closed and 

an ear taped down —

a scholar of what is not possessed.

One eye stares at the crosshatch of utility lines

and repeating somersaults of birds —

the fried egg smell of the diner

fitted over ants, paper scraps, gum and

possibility. All the whirl’s

a stage and singing to the birds

of a dream of empty schools.

We are done with tidal bores

and stand forever at low tide

in our caftans eating crackers and cheese.

In the tide’s path, colossal cities —

and the houses; in one yard 

it’s fall already, 

a translucent tree with slivers 

of red and yellow on the ground. 

In another it’s flooded, 

brackish and brown hanging.

Summers of yellow leaves and banks of iris gone,

timbres impossible to recover in the skein

of storms and trees shattered among 

the dry dreams of errands.

Green has a birthday —

always slender and fashionable,

always, I think we can agree,

rising through spraddled trees and thickets

that tear at you and never let you hide —

tiresome, but now cups and spoons

laid in the glen and a prize

for the best homage in plaid

and it will end at sunset when rosebud

is having a fete, and then dark,

with its decisive smothering 

of doubt and variety, will scuff

over the empty lawn and carry it off to bed.