Mono Craters

Volcanic action formed the valley floor,
and capped itself with pumice domes that locked
obsidian within, until the more
insistent pressure blew the caps, unlocked
the boulders vitreous and black, and hurled
material of lava, ash and sand
that laid a lake bed like an alien world,
within a bowl of percolating land.

Volcanic craters frame the cup of sky,
so we are roofed with stars and ringed with heights.
And as our fire fades to coals, we eye
it from above and see it breathing lights:
the pulsing glow of waning flames that seem
a lake of lava poised to crest and stream.

Moon Over 120

A dark gray ribbon organized the land,
an asphalt arrow to the eastern pass,
dividing pumice into field and strand,
and making shoulders in the desert grass.
The moon hung heavy silver on our right;
it striped the road with puddles soft and black,
that blended in its dips all tones of night
until our headlights chased the shadows back.

We can’t believe the heat mirage of day
that punctuates the road with phantom pools.
Now desert moon deludes our eyes to play
a shadow trick, for human eyes are tools
to testify and yet to be deceived
by images so instantly believed.

Being in Death Valley

The planet’s skin erupts, distributes rock,
and makes escapement for a stellar clock,
while we are butterflies against the walls,
less permanent than desert waterfalls
(like birds or lizards darting in this place,
we touch the shadows on the desert’s face).

There’s marble walls and fields of golden stone,
a mauve ceramic crater lately thrown,
a plant that bleaches under mounting light
to ivory skeleton of pallid white,
and bowls of canyon shoulders everywhere
that shimmer arid mistiness in air.

Although the place is endless, ancient, wild,
the shape’s a cradle here, and I’m a child.

Away Today

(Pre-Covid Travel)

It’s minutes after midnight where I sit
upon this hotel bed in Washington,
but way out west where you are, there’s a bit
of time remaining till your day’s begun.
So I say happy birthday on the phone
but you’re in yesterday compared to me,
and I to you am in tomorrow’s zone –
our dates won’t coincide until it’s three.

If you could travel fast and west right then,
and teleport to spots around the earth,
today could start a dozen times again
and stretch commemoration of your birth.
But since I can’t be with you for a week,
more day length’s the reverse of what I seek.

Waikiki

Transitioning today to Waikiki,
we ready for the culture shock: the crowd
that waits outside The Cheesecake Factory;
the flares of tiki torches; pulsing loud
and bass-less music blasting from the bars
that perforates the beach like scattershot;
the waves of brand-name stores; the tides of cars
and taxi cabs; the sidewalk polyglot.

It’s called the capital of paradise
but nobody would argue it’s the best,
unless the score depends on Mai Tai price
and luau shows, and time-share talks addressed
to people so commercially confused,
they can’t tell if they’re anxious or amused.

Alone Unlonely

Our three-day stay includes a rental car,
and we have driven southerly and east.
The island’s too minute to travel far,
but we’ve explored aquaria, increased
our height from level sea to see a star
observatory – miles high at least –
and we don’t know where all the tourists are;
we wander unmolested, unpoliced.

The restaurants we pick are never loud.
We’re driving where we want with little stress.
Perhaps the western beaches have the crowd,
and maybe sunset luaus host the mess
of lumpy shoppers, flowers in their hair,
but we’re enjoying tropic solitaire.

Papio in Pa’ia

The travel guides advise us not to miss
this site or that attraction, to secure
our tickets in advance for that or this,
insisting a vacation must be sure
to tick off most the must-sees on a list
some enterprising blogger mapped for all.
But we’re agreed it’s easy to resist
the coupons, crowds, and every shopping mall.

We share a private cottage so benign
we want to linger long and late in it.
We use the rental car with attitude
of exploration – routes without a sign.
Reserving nothing feels appropriate,
and all we seek from people is good food.

A Rest on Maui

Arrested by a rest on Maui, sweet
and light and dreamless, eyelids closed and yet
insightful, air caressing neck and feet,
I’d stagger if I tried to stand up now.
I feel I’d would wobble if I tried to move
or talk – this morning I’ve forgotten how
and what I used to strategize to prove.

I’m slowing down to island time, as calm
as if I were immersed in water hot
enough to soften me. Above a palm
is fluttering its fronds, and I forgot
to wonder what to do today, with time,
or worry at the pitches of this rhyme.