Poem of the west

I watched a green-haired sloth

smoking on the porch

near the town limit sign with the cross.

.

Now climbing the ladder,

I ache to see the old west

before the gold rush

and before you grew so tall.

.

Away from summer, I should hum

the tune from my childhood zither

all red and flowered and much missed.

.

How did it go? Was it as fresh

as the breeze we drew our kites

up inside, funneling child laughs

and rhymes of sky castles

.

or did the wind that brought us here

sound of thunderous applause

for having made the journey to this valley?

.

I watched roads widen into

fields into oceans into planets

while the sloth smoked, tapping

the penny against the table.

.

If I had my zither, I would pluck

more than my flying dreams and sing

to you of rattlesnake waltzes.

.

This is good, remembering warmth

of old suns over young bones

as we grow longer in thought

and shrink in space.

.

I am an explorer hidden inside a mother

inside an afternoon of breaking skies

and beds of wild grasses.