An island of truth
on the dry river bed:
a mattress
that swims with the sand
and keeps it secrets hid so well
it seems ever at one
with the mallards and killdeer,
lawn chairs and golf balls,
the stick nest springing in the tire.
The sun shines on all of them equally,
there's no way this
tennis shoe
can't fit
in the desiccated strand
of cat tail and thistle,
where muskrats still hide in coyote tobacco,
ping pong balls
in the transient cliff side,
but an eye
can see them all, a mind can choose to judge
or not
the unresolved past
of coffee cup plastic,
take-out black
and Natural American Spirit packs
(litterers' favorite).
The birds behind blinds
of milkweed and castor bean
chilling at home
don't pay it no mind
until we come to claim it
like a stone on a sluice
and they run, to the endless air,
their voices, for once, breaking.
