From Long and Long Ago

I saw a monarch butterfly today
the second one I’ve seen all summer.
She met me in broad daylight,
amid a treacherous slumber.

Told me to listen. Just listen.
What you need lives in the air.
To float like me is to be far and near.

I remember you, I say.
You remember me? she asks
from long and long ago.

She offered me pine and mulberries
to savor in my dreams.
My heart was seen.

Shadow Snake

Too slick to trust

A shadow snake

Still I dance through the teeth of fate

I beg the God with bloodshot eyes

Could I strike with the soil?

Can I rewrite my sky?

Forgive me now, or let me go

Forgive me—flesh and stone

Tryna find my way alone

Truth don’t come but confesses

Still learning how to break

Behind tints possessive

Gazelle

Could I be a gazelle

Admiring the wind

Learning from her

Becoming the wind

Smelling the storm

Seeing the atoms of mist

As all gazelles do

Waiting

Waiting