cx.

the mountains dark arms open
blue grey twilight glowing cool and bright above them
lamps above shadowed buildings, at the entrance
gleaming by the slope

in the parking lot still and quiet, breeze
whisking a few leaves across the dark gray asphalt

the light pooling across the lines
warm and golden behind the screen
moving behind the counter
     kids running around the tables--

so the night's like a coat,

      --at the corner, he's wearing feathers and stripes
         for Samhain--

I made a ghost-list
to list my dead,

the name and date, I remember them
      --briefly, each
I think well of them
and I hope they're well

the soft burnt scent of summer falling to fall
hangs over the cement
the sliver moon and one star hanging next to the radio tower
the lights, cupped, gleam across the brick wall

the headlights streaming slowly
across the intersection
streaming steadily above the divider
the street makes a living altar of the night

cviii.

the moon rides the night sky, rolling to full
I think you're a bird and
you fly elsewhere, over wave
through wind, across mountain

peaks, arrayed like waves

we here below walk, sideways
the day is a dancer, moments
leap and kick, roll in a circle
arms spinning,

across the sidewalk, over the
asphalt,

some moment it will kick out
to where waves are,

where walking is and where flying
are the same place, woven
and weaving through time,

if things fall over, and roll out
of rhythm, into another

turn over each other, it's true
that it's all one movement,

far peaks and far skies, tableland
spread beyond the checkpoint,
dwarfs the arches

rivers glowing in the grassland
late summer, waves breaking

against the near shore, past
the horizon,

waves crashing in the mind only
through the snow-blocked passes
in the dark,

walk the wind blowing in from some
other coastline,

fly the wind rising across the line
from somewhere
beyond us

between the darkness, all winds
are the same wind,

if we are blown out and off course

into other places, all places are one
time, and in one wind,

dance together.