a recent poem about the mountains near where I live

Holy Ghost Creek

A lucky orange dog with thick hair & red

bandana crosses the interstate near

Glorieta Pass,

not quite controlled burn smoke

hangs in the valley, low

leathery brown over the round

green hills all muddied together

like spirit bison.

Up the trail along the Holy Ghost to old

Baldy, ascending tiers of tiny pastures

fading yellow now

fervid with September asters &

cinquefoil,

the higher I hike

the burbling trickle of a creek

crosses me more than once.

I’ve imagined it

coursing through my veins,

blood disciple,

a transfusion of headwaters

streaming in spring

cataracts down from a

treeless domed summit

& running away with the best of me

until it plows into the indefatigable

Pecos, shedding its snowmelt,

destined for the valley of

these summer burns.

Impervious old Baldy

the clouds build themselves about

his mastiff head in

no particular order;

there were herds of bison

down below the smoke once;

their spirit shadows drink from

the Holy Ghost, still.