This Is for All the Lonely People

Splitting kindling
under a dwindling sun

Leaves on the ground
beneath the trees
Delicious–golden and red

Leaves damp
brown

Redwood and fir snags
Spires on the southern sky
Line after line
reminds me of you
and how far it is between
those twisting trees

Kindling split
in baskets
I never brought to you

Feet up on the porch rail
My favorite self-portrait

Listening to America
the original band
Lonely People
After so many calls, texts, emails

Purple plum branches
bare and gray
Huckleberry flourishing
from an old growth stump
Green moss tempers
charcoal wood

Why do I smile
while America plays
Lonely People
Maybe it's you
Maybe it's a winter's day
winding down
sitting still

Bevy of quail
in the yard
Less skittery than summer
when I let you down
They huddle and cuddle
against the chill
and their tiny movements
crackle the leaves
lying brown
under the trees
Delicious–red and golden
like the state
we're in

America playing
Lonely People
This should be the end
we've come back around

A day is dusking
Still we smile
In the distance
a chainsaw starts
or is it a motorcycle
Too late to start sawing

A day is dusking

A friend texts
to love a photo
of the sea
and the gulls
and the waves
that roll back
to hours ago

Gray clouds
overhead
pushing west
like my ancestor
a hundred seventy years ago

From Ontario
Canada
to Californ
Equines his only companions

He rode a horse with no name
through the desert
without America playing
on an iPhone

How lonely was he?

We smile and ride on
across the centuries
into the sunset
with our narcissistic tendencies

Dusk doesn't turn to gloom
Days don't die
under the stars
They just rest
to brighten
tomorrow

When it'll be alright
and the croaking toads
will hush
to let us pass

on our hike
to that bare spire
at the top
of the hill

That long and twisting trail
while America plays
This is for all the lonely people

And the brown leaves
feed the ground
nourishing the trees
Delicious
red and golden

Flip an iPhone just right
and America plays on
into the dark and beyond