~

The hour was cold, early
under the redwoods;
in the crust and crinkle
of copper and ferric decay, the Light —
an elusive display of apathy.
We, imbricate shadows, intruded — fugitives
to its saturating presence.

Reasons of retaliation
tethered a dog-eared sadness
that may or may not have been our own.
A thirteen-mile amputation
between our dying grandfather and the breath-
engulfed moments anchored our longings,
my brother and I — lingering
in what we mis-took as refuge
under the carbon-releasing,
Carbon Canyon
trees.

We’d tied ourselves to the liminal spaces
we’d always known.
Dovetailed into the cauldron
of our childhood streets,
we’d fabricate warmth
in the warp and weave that accompanied us.
Wandering now instead through fern-
dense undergrowth and wind-scribbled
branches, we tried convincing
our shadow-selves we were on the verge
of striation.

It was simple,
in the crumble of seasons and expectations,
to assure the jangling breezes that Light revealed us.
It was easy, we thought,
to tamper with its luster beneath arboreal filaments.
Riveted by the divinations
of deciduous death, it was solace —
in our need for sacred illusions —
to misconstrue the luminescent Light
a tender,
noble thing.