when you lay down to ponder desolate vistas,
smoke pours from your head. there's fire
and there are feathers also.

but autumn's constant weather has nothing
to do with this flock of birds
migrating above your bed,

it is the scorched panorama
of your mind that we
are fleeing from.

it is a canvas stretching continuously,
eventually catching up. we
fall into your craters, your vast wounds,

lizard ribs already half submerged
in sand. won't you take responsibility
for these barbed cacti,

for these joshua trees who haphazardly
scatter their shadows- their accusations,
in all directions?

or are we merely beached rubble,
our voices metallic with pain?