Again in June, a poem called "On Cortaro Road."
So one of the things I'm thinking of for-- this
is a section that leads, like the keys for a long poem that
follows.
And in my mind is-- the fact, there's
no such places as Cortaro, even though that's
my mailing address.
So I have an imaginary city called
Cortaro, which I'll be using in the poem that follows this.
"This is a lonely place.
Three mountain ranges drift into the sky, held
by telephone and power lines.
Fields of green alfalfa and cotton along the roads,
Silverbell to the old mine, Pima farms to the guest ranches,
and unpaved trails to Cortaro.
An old man with a stray dog, his bent saguaro
ribbed cane bearing a scant weight the wind bends around.
I haven't seen a face beneath his brown hat, not at any hour.
It's so common to pass him, I wonder
if he ever stops winding out of the washes
among these barbed hills.
But then those owls that swoop up at night,
I never found their homes.
I admire his steady gait, the lean shadow.
He's taken to waving, hardly a nod as I pass,
and I've begun to wave back at him.