This juniper,
this soft orange dirt under my heels,
these O’Keeffe clouds
white muffins on the glass pan of the sky
ants that carry their translucent pink and brown boulders

Will you ever understand the smell of the monsoons
with me

With 100 feet of sky framed by trees above me
how I miss the distant, blue mountains of the West
And once returned to the West
how quickly those mountains become background

If we look up
Into the convex mirror of the sky
Screened by the hay loft netting
Will we see the whole world
Left to us by dead men
As though standing on dusty cars in barns
Laughing to catch the sleeping bags as we throw them
Was the way to secret divinity?

And if I jump
From the sky
Will I become virga
Rain to steam
And evaporate before I hit the ground,
the buildings
the heat upon the street
the fountains and the birds and the beaches
the sound of the wind in the trees and the flags
the smell of sheets and milk and oranges and old brick?

Or if you jump
Will I evaporate you?

Or if we jump
what happens then?