11th Year Drought
I think I know enough
science to say
there’s more light now
than the sky can hold . . .
cypress and tamarisk,
withered on the edge
of the cliff—silhouettes,
death-sticks rattling
along the air.
No sea mist
rises off the promontory
beyond which we expect
more hand-outs from the blue,
nasturtiums, pittosporum,
and pampas grass
to come back on their own. . . .
In the park, I follow
the dust down the paths
counting the absent
leaves of coral trees,
the back-broken eucalyptus
but where will counting
get us?
Darkness and
no EXIT as far back as
the first web-footed fish
crawling out from under
the waves, chancing
a lung-full of bright,
terrible air beside
the Cambrian plants,
from which, in no time,
we’d develop deficit spending,
microchips, space travel,
and enough theories
to support each and every
permutation of greed
despite working with
a finite number of particles
from the get-go. . . .
Down
the block, they’re blasting
a techno-babble beat again,
nothing you can close
the windows on—
so I might as well sit out
on the porch and hum along
with the largely empty sky,
beneath the exhausted silk trees,
the exhausted stars,
and wait to return to air,
given all our green years
and hope have come to.
CHRISTOPHER BUCKLEY is editor of NAMING THE LOST: THE FRESNO POETS—Interviews & Essays (Stephen F. Austin State Univ. Press, 2021). Read more.