The Temple

Tonight we embrace phantoms.
The ghosts of passenger pigeons
sing 60-cycle noise over our homes
Ancient plants combust in praise
unrolling waves of carbon to the sky
The lakes and rivers and wells
have graciously receded from our path

The ancient hills are wet mud
pouring through our fingers
The forests are a flame
searing our palms
The touch of every living thing
is matted wool and pieces of silver

What a shameful honor
to be priests of a temple in ruins
At its crumbling walls
we cannot imagine
Things we will never know
Something beautiful was broken
and we are haunted

For Dean Moriarty, For Neal Cassiday

In the pavement there is a ghost
mountain to valley
coast to coast

A love that passes around the world
face to face
girl to girl

A shiny car moans into the night
dusk to dawn
light to light

A shaking vision across the West
place to place
Never to rest

Edward Abbey

In the Arizona twilight
There is a flame dancing within a flame
That is turning your billboards
fastly into carbon

See; a sioux war party
descends from the clouds.
They have come to claim
The cities and the machines

Children everywhere listen
to the hum of empty mansions
They carry it over pavement
and write it on their hands

You; Your bullets cannot pass
The ghosts who are dancing
Your cups cannot hold
The medicine in the hills

there is no cigarette,
no gas can, no lincoln continental
There is not even night
or an obsidian blade
There is no unseen hand
but your own