Blue Gardens

Scott Elliott

 

Wasting away in the desert

Hoping someone will save me

Looking for a deity

when the sun goes down

Waiting for something I know nothing of

 

Bloody hands claw again

the sand  the alkali

for clay  for miracles

The hawk swoops lower

Coyotes venture near

 

Trapped in the eye

of the passing eagle

over distant mountains

Burnt and strangled by heat

Viewing grand raptures by thirst

 

Strange faces linger

then go

At midnight

Laying beneath endless stars

I can nearly touch

 

Scarcely illuminated are blue gardens

in the empty night

Moving toward it

I crawl like an injured serpent

until it is drowned away by dawn

 

The sun  The animals  The Gods

will find me now

reeking of sin and salvation

an apparition from the other world

lost and dizzy in the light