Riding the Southwest Chief is like watching a Western.
In both I am a passive observer. In both, the same landscape
of mesas and rocky sandstone outcroppings.

In one the camera moves across the landscape. In the other,
the engine of the train moves me across the landscape.

In one there are riders on horseback, both bareback and saddleback.
In the other, horses graze in backyards, some cluttered
with aluminum cans, schoolbuses and old automobiles.

In one, life is fast paced but the same repetitive plot is played out;
this one is edited, color saturated and processed, or black and white.
The other seemingly offers no plot; it is perhaps more akin
to time lapse photography, and not unlike life.
A pinon emerges from slate on grey sandstone.
A pickup parallels the path of the train.
Brown tenacious leaves of gambel oak still
ornament the oak. Other trees, uprooted by drought or flood,
grasp the air like tentacles, one branch of their root system
still clinging to the soil.

One offers only answers. The other offers
time for reflection and encourages me to explore
unanswered questions, both practical and philosophical.
How do you whisper “I love you” across a thousand miles of tracks?

In one it seems to always be summer. In the other, a landscape
of gray skies and snow flurries, winter is reluctant to let go.

Their grey skirts
and tuxedos
offer a perfect
camouflage against
winter’s grey.

Their single
adornment,
garnet jewels
to veil each face.

When they plunge
seamlessly head down,
their elegant necks
tuck into the fish
of the Rio Grande.

When they emerge,
the droplets clustered
on their beaks shine
like cut glass,
or cultivated pearls.

Here I offer all that I am
All that I might be
All that we are
Together
Like
Sand
In an hourglass
When I reach that point
When I find that I am empty,
Only then can I be filled again.

How the papery
envelope of the
ruby-studded fruit
rattles as it tears.

It’s on the periphery where everything happens,
where ocean meets shore, where river carves a gorge,
where forest meets meadow and mountain meets valley.
On the shore, waves break and spin backwards. Some creatures,
like starfish and clam, horseshoe crab and barnacle,
float between two worlds, almost merging them.
Even in the heavens, when cold air fronts meet warm air,
energy excites (like a swarm of bees), creating thunderstorms
and lightning. The ocean gathers grains of sand like pearls,
depositing them in the far reaches of the ocean floor,
and erodes the shoreline grain by grain. The synergy
between these two, ocean and shore, represents
an hourglass on a geological timescale.

The sun and the earth
held in the balance.
The sun, though enormous,
casts no shadow,
nor overpowers the earth.

Think of the power
unleashed in the splitting
of the atom. Think
of the destruction.

Immortality split for us.
How does the universe recover?
The sorrow of that splitting echoes.
We each carry our song, our
little piece in the composition.
We each live a note,
live out a phrase, to mirror
a part of the score.

I’m not a painter by trade,
arranging a bowl of fruit
for a still life.
My art surges from within.
My body is the conductor,
a channel for energy.

Still, the bowl
on the canvas
seems to shimmer
like the scales of a fish
stunning midair:
For every action,
an opposite reaction.
For every push,
a pull.

When the surgeon cut
the mole from the scalp,
his scalpel
applied a current
to my body’s cells,
like lightning
to my sap.
My cells’ resistance
supplied the heat
for the operation;
my body, a pathway
for the charge flow.

And isn’t this poetry:
tapping into
the body’s power
to electrify?

Light broken for us
into its myriad wavelengths
allows us to see.
In a canyon, each facet
of the rugged rock
reflects a unique variegated shade.
In order for us to perceive
light must be pierced,
shattered, spun down, and
embraced by shadow.
Yet even broken shards
of glass channel light,
conjuring fire.
All life revolves
on this principle:
to multiply,
a cell must first
divide.

Goldfinches in the front yard sing.
The sunflowers drew them in.
How sparks flash
when goldfinches feast on the seeds
of the sunflower!
The apses of sunflowers
are vaulted panels of light.
Finches will mine
this honeycomb
for weeks,
then scatter suddenly,
as if startled,
abandoning the last
of the sunflower seeds.

With autumn,
gold on the stalk
fades to ochre,
and a dry leaf
jangles among raspy stalks
like a card caught
in the spokes
of a bicycle wheel.

Do the feathers of the goldfinch
shine through winter,
or do they mirror
the sunflowers’
rattling petals of bronze?

Under a frost-tinged landscape
the waiting seed overwinters
banking on its honeycomb of gold.