this beginning may have always meant this end
coming
from a place where we meandered mornings and met quail, scrub jay,
mockingbird, i knew coyote, like everyone else, i knew
cactus, knew
tumbleweed, lichen on the rocks and pill bugs beneath, rattlers
sometimes, the soft smell of sage and the ferment of cactus pear. coming
from this place, from a place where grass might grow greener on the
hillside in winter than in any yard, where, the whole rest of the year,
everything i loved, chaparral pea, bottle brush tree, jacaranda,
mariposa, pinyon and desert oak, the kumquat in the back garden and
wisteria vining the porch, the dry grass whispering long after the last
rains, raccoons in and out of the hills, trash hurled by the hottest
wind, the dry grass tall now and golden, lawn chairs,
eucalyptus,
everything, in a place we knew, every thing, we knew, little and large
and mine and ours, except horror, all of it, everything could flame up
that quickly, could flare and be gone.
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