for the desert tortoise
like tree bark curled into whirlpools of stone,
burrowed under earth while the sun burned down
and Coyote roamed the sand—do we, too, return,
each to our dens in the shivering dark,
wear armor as a shelter we can carry,
don't we, on your back, touch earth?
Sometimes, ever so slowly, we learn of the sweetness
of cactus fruit, mesquite grass, the arid wind
as the sound of an ocean rustling in creosote,
what the long-awaited rain can yet resurrect.
Coyote watches. He marvels; what small wisdom,
your survival, in this rising heat,
in this strange home you have made.
