We scramble up a ragged crest to
catch it as it thrashes
down over the bloodthirsty
cliffs of Sonora,
a million Saguaro cacti in a daze
like an army on Mars,
dancers in a
thousand-year dance
moving like starfish on the beach
of a dead ocean.
This is a myth with spines
that jump,
where yellow birds born
in the dark hollow eyes
burst into the world with mouths open
and shadows snake slowly inland
swallowing everything smooth
and whole as water,
like the open mouth of the soul
and its quicksand reflection,
arms dig into the ground
and reach up for the last rose-milk tear
of tomorrow.
We sit on a rock
torn from the boiling earth
a million years ago
and she stretches farther and farther away
like a cold shadow.
We sit
silent until my hands
turn white from the moon
and my pockets crawl
with scorpions.

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Mather Schneider drives a cab in Tucson, AZ.