VENUS

my evenings in summer. I couldn't smoke at Kari's when I lived there so I found the clubhouse. when I'd ask people if they wanted to come there they'd say yes and we'd zigzag sharp upthe hill through the sages and past mellow pink & graygreen donkeytail succulents and we'd wedge our ankles into seats to prop us on, and they'd say, I thought there would be an actual house, here. I loved it at sunset 10:30 at the tip of summer mountain standard time, when up & to the right there'd be glowing venus. I can do anything I want to now, here, so I sit on the balcony in the trunk of summer at sunset around 8:07 central standard time and up to the right there, thar she glows. familiar as ever. if I were in Idaho still I might lament that the trunk of summer radiates nervously, that days shorten at not my wanting, for I've no doubt the same sun sets there, too. I share a timezone with you. doesn't that craze me? meaning makes me crazy. I'll always think of the sultry air surrounding me at this moment, forever I know it. I might not ever quit at saying so. time changes, my zoning mutates. but I've my forever promises & my familiar footholds in any muting sky of summernight. I'll die with some imprint of a silhouetted palm behind eyelid quakes.
there be no doubt in that.

re liable

last night we went to our clubhouse,
nickey, chad, ida following the sunset path
through the sagebrush, past the aspen
and the pinkening donkeytail succulents
to our place between the two pines
on that awkward slope that sores legs
or jambs toes to sit on.
just in time for that first star.
we talked abt what new orleans is like
abt a fantasy mansionhouse
and our brilliant year-round gardens.
a man came up from the house below.
we met him the night before,
he told us we got his curiosity up
bc there lives a family of fox
and a coyote who chases the babies around.
he thought we might be them.
I think abt fox & coyotes a lot
I think how I'd like to join them.
last night he came & sat with us, this neighbor
he was glad to hear there were some liberal people living in the stepford houses
he told us that we were saved for this time,
that we were reserved for this moment
to carry the future. to teach, bc we have the structure
to teach the careless generations beneath us.
he told us about his world drums, slurring his speech,
ice jingling in his plastic cup
he invited us to his sweatlodge.
I was looking at the fullnight sky, by now
envisioning you, flipping your hair
miles & miles away
I was thinking of what I'd say to you had I been filterless
promises I'd make & keep
drives to take. getting you at me.
I am not a wish
  but I am a big future
and I committed to the notions of
  gratitude & accountability
     for my good fullfuture hands
I like the wild dog path we're taking
past the sucs, past the aspen
and I like the certainty that I'm contained, somewhere
there
in a promise to the selves I will undoubtedly keep

still the same year in here

A new house, same creatures surrounding. A new season; last it was creeping around and out of the winter, and here we are, creeping into it. The windowsill is adorned with the jokes of the forced natural past; we've the plasticmade dreamcatcher, beaded, feathered & chimed; an avocado, ripening in its avocadant opportunity; little puffed leaves of all the succulents, the dying jade from chicago, the spiny triplets from boise, the tall, pencil cactus from new york; half a geode; an ancient pinecone snatched from cabin; shells, corals, and other seaside accoutrement; a tin animal-covered box from the third grade.

The table, too, with its copious corns. Plentiful horns. 

But the finalizing of college, the escape, and the duties held. By the end of to-day I will have made the right impressions.