David Chorlton

Morning Scenes

I
Yesterday’s unused minutes
fly out through the open window. Time present
and time past, both perhaps present
in time future, but not
where there’s a new sky every day
above the old desert. To canyons and mountains
time is nothing
but an itch.

II
Lost hours
drifting, new hours
rising; see them climb
the palm tree last week’s lightning hit
when thunder shook the minutes
from the hour.

III
During the night
three million birds flew over the county
while loose change was accruing
interest in the pockets where it lay.
Lizards on the sidewalk
run toward the shade and clocks
cannot catch up with them.

IV
Turkey vulture floating
above La Puente Avenue, searching for
the detritus of careless lives.
A lady in the park
picks up broken glass to clear
the ground of danger, slowly, slowly. Everything happening
in Sunday time.

Mountain’s Day

The mountain wakes up from its starry sleep.
Last night’s migration crossed
without a sound and a raven
flies out of the sun
with a hoarse call in his beak.
There’s a full day ahead, bearing the weight

of so much changing light: the first
rose wash that brings
rock to life, the gilded morning
and red-tailed noon. Nowhere for the heat to go

as daylight runs its course
up to the ridgeline
and down, down into the crevices and gullies
where the animals dream
who will become darkness
after the shifting course of shadows
reveals the dip and rise the slopes are
when they relax

at day’s end. And the coyotes running
on trails into the night have no idea
of how cold it must be
on the white, chalky moon.

 

The Local View

Two humble peaks look down across the neighborhood
from Walatowa Street to
Forty-eighth, where early risers walk
with the day on a leash.
The desert’s eye

is watching. A lengthy stillness
followed by a quick
run to the store and back, the leaf blower
coughing dust, first round on the golf course and
it can tell which side
the campaign signs are on. The sun

debates the foothills
while rain keeps its opinion
to itself. The pond lies back and contemplates
the air space. The hawk makes a first

dive through a pigeon flock.
He occupies the same
branch every morning and waits
for the planet’s heart
begin to beat, and gently it does

one opinion at a time, one party snapping
at the other’s heels, the picking of flesh
from the bones, and the beautiful lifting
into flight with a wingspread like a blessing.

 

David Chorlton is a European now with roots deep in Arizona ground. There are aspects of Phoenix he likes that don’t often dominate outside opinion of it, such as the large area of desert that runs through the city and gives him a place to check in with nature.