Down Tonto Creek with The Greg

To Matthew and Louis, who go with the flow

A safety net for reality, he said, an escape
From having to placate the rigmarole of the grid,
We took Route 666, to Deliverance West,
Gisella, dove naked off the cliffs.

A streamway of big daddy koi currents encircled us
Through pond fronds at the entrance. At the stream rapid bend
We swam, in cold flow we called balls, tits and snatch.
A silky water muskrat plopped in from a juniper branch.

We hopped pink and purple rocks, across, to agave fuzz,
Swollen pollen sand, bark sprayed with rust, our hearts
Dropped when the milk thistle tufts released, floated up air.
We fell in below the feathery fields of flax on the bluff

To curliques of roots on a fallen sycamore,
Bare capillary branches on its side,
A man fishing with his boy said "this is my life."
Mounds of white rock turned red in the percolating stream.


Along satin-frosted cliffs embellished with sajuaro
Arteries of chartreuse grass, monstrous straw,
Grotesque reeds billowing, and along the swale
Of slick pink rock, a contoured beach, red sand,

But redneck ATVs were dug in, with Bud in cases for the duration,
Forcing us up the fudge chunks of glistening quartzite
Past the purple brain-case granite to undress and a mossy entrance
Where we touched the emerald swirl of canyon water

To float sideways under pyramids of blue and orange stone,
Trees blowing on the shore like delicate broccoli of another world,
Green dragon flames in water black under monoliths to climb
And dive in bronze light 30 feet, the water tearing like a kaleidoscope.

The campers had left, so we lay naked on the sand bar
'Til a Coot, riding the river surface, came to recover a pair of flip flops,
A woman saw our asses and smiled, drove back to her drunk husband.
Sajuaros spoke to each other across the canyon, revealing nothing.

Walking back, we saw seagrass in the sand, driftwood, clam shells
And bleached, rounded boulders. Like the tide through the trees,
The desert valley bellows blew along the locomotive river stones.
A red dragonfly swam above white logs still on topographic waters.

Back at the bend we passed pale blonde girls with peace signs
And shirtless men in cowboy hats, Mexican hippies, and dune buggies
Flopped on the banks, people swimming in their clothes,
The whole community laughing, sharing beers, bodies, times—

Guy-SEE-la's river people: ranch hands, horse help, scrub country
Meth lab technicians, happy as hell in their dusty trailers,
Star-clustered weeds growing out of their '69 Impalas
(Finally something not an homage to the golden age of chrome).

At sunset, on telephone hill, we saw it all again before us:
The verdant valley, crystal mountains, homes to drive away.
Few wind these ecstatically scented roads unless they live here.
The Greg decide they want to change their names.