Entering Desert


The desert is a high-pitched scream
if you want it to be;
a wire stretched from where you stand
to the horizon,
a gate inviting the first step
to oblivion. Or an embrace
so wide you fall through it
until the wings of a phainopepla
lift you back into the dizzy light,
where you’re spinning around your own finger
that points at the sun
as if offering directions.

Waiting for the Sphinx Moth


Drawn along a thread of perfume
that binds an orange tree to the acacia
the sphinx moth has awakened

and its eye is a searchlight through time.
It will come
while we are looking away

with its stained glass wings
spread open to the light. We know
it is close; we have marked on the calendar

the date it is due, and now all
that remains is to look
for the miracle

in a time of despair. It will come
as a heartbeat flying
between late afternoon’s glow

and the full moon. It will be
a book with two pages
that opens once in a lifetime

revealing its secret to the vigilant
for whom the days
melt at a touch

and there are no boundaries
to the desert
in the hourglass.