Goldenrod

i've never known enough places or people

to go on abandoning them

though I wonder whether the land has changed

or i have changed

the late persimmons hold their orange light

the same light of the burned forests

off to the west

the same light on the crests of night waves

swells that toss and tether their tenuous shadows

to the living

and today I sound like a snatch of summer wildfire

with nothing left to burn

but a scrap of love

& breaching through walls of my own skin

the orange poppies are blooming

across my chest

another hour stunned quiet under a gray sky

a taste of ashes on the tongue

black bone

as night follows its downward course