TS #15 Logo By Haze McElhenny Canyon, Road, and Mountain:
    Notes from a journey
    by David Chorlton

    I
    When the Interstate traffic crawls
    the mountains in the distance
    after barely keeping pace
    catch up with us and stop
    while desert scrub and agave in bloom
    go by in slow, soundless motion
    between a Scenic Highway sign
    and one that reads Zoned Industrial.



    II
    Benson, Arizona: bright sun, adobe mural,
    broken kiosk with a telephone, auto supply,
    Fish Fry, freight train, single story motels,
    Ocean massage, a breath of cigarette smoke
    on the wind.



    III
    On terraces leading down
    into the earth
    where it is opened and mined,
    mismatched colours run together;
    violet, black, and barren ochre
    with a single splash
    of green
    when a tree grips hard on the ledge.



    IV
    A double yellow line rises and dips through the uninhabited miles
    beside the Chiricahua foothills. Grass is the colour of sand
    on mounds among the lava fields where, for want of trees,
    a hawk's nest straddles the wires on a telegraph pole.



    V
    Above the canyon ringing
    with cicadas
    the full moon climbs
    over the shadow wall
    and opposite, the rocks
    turn ghostly blue.



    VI
    Cave Creek Canyon: Arizona Sister,
    dragonfly, Cabbage White in purple thistle,
    shadows bored into the high, red cliffs,
    mosquito drone, broken light among
    the sycamore, warm scent rising
    out of fallen needles from the pines.



    VII
    The spider
    spinning a web across the canyon
    has a long way to go.
    While a Painted Redstart sings,
    while a fallen trunk decays,
    it spins
    its thread of mist.



    VIII
    Falling now, the sun
    shines through
    the bodies of the insects
    swarming
    near a feeder, where small birds
    dive and hover,
    turning motion of their wings into
    revolving doors of light.



    IX
    Go outside and pick a star;
    something floating in the universe.
    We're riding on a leaf

    with water, wind and moonlight
    washing up against the mountain

    in a silver spray.



    X
    The first call comes from anywhere:
    streamside,
    through the canyon wall,
    behind
    a rock.
    Then the focus narrows
    to the sycamore.
    We follow it,
    louder,
    farther off,
    until suddenly
    the shade cracks open
    on a Trogon's breast.



    XI
    The slag heap south of Silver City
    glistens in hazy sun.
    On earth-green hills
    the buckthorn cholla
    fill with purple blooms
    and dry light flows
    down both sides
    of the Continental Divide.



    XII
    On a forest trail
    in the almost dark
    a plaintive call
    comes from the trees,
    then a sharper one,
    insistent and invisible
    until the ground
    absorbs the light.



    XIII
    Wild iris grow in the high meadows.
    Red marks new growth on the firs.
    Water twists sharply on its shallow bed
    and the June wind turns the aspens
    liquid green before it runs
    through the centre of a boulder's ear.



    XIV
    Miles into the afternoon
    we step out off the forest
    and come back to Mourning Cloaks
    above the still warm grass
    with the sacred peaks behind us
    glistening in Apache snow.



    XV
    Between thin air
    and thick earth,
    the swallows
    and the snakes,
    a smooth sky
    and pockmarked lava rocks,
    we walk at the altitude
    of wild roses,
    fast running water,
    and slow breath.



    XVI
    Pronghorns on the meadow at eight thousand feet;

    falcons on the wing above Salt River Canyon;

    the desert moves toward us

    on a six percent grade.
Edited By Jim Chandler & Haze McElhenny
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