Hollyhocks buzz. This
Nude, sun-and-shade adobe
Dreams up thunderheads.
2.
We watch the last, brown
Cottonwood leaf fall to earth.
Where is all the gold?
3.
T-shirt weather on
Tu casa's south side. At it's
Shade-bound north: hard ice.
4.
Albuquerque springs
Back to delicious life through
Lilac and iris.
5.
Brown river hums this
Bright, sweet tune of cottonwood
Bosque, rattlesnaked.
6.
Over mesquite plains
Soar silent, trackless orbs, Mu-
Tilated cattle.
7.
Dust-devils traverse
La Jornada del Muerto,
Gathering greasewood.
8.
Cottonwood cotton
Drifts bury my stubborn grief
Under summer's snow.
9.
Who left this city
Of red clay, stone, wind, and sun
Abandonado.
10.
Purple thistle nods.
Some drunk Navajo stumbles
Past. Boots; horizon.
Daniel Samek
11/18/87