A momentary loss of footing
Sent a few pebbles
and a body tumbling down.
A wheel gets more rounded over time.
Falling over the rounded ledge of a cliff,
Two sharp pains.
Grabbing the cactus as a final self arrest
And the scream that tumbled after me.
Desert cotton
blowing across the smooth stones
of the river bottom.
Follow the drift
settling onto the Salt
to begin another drift.
Towering cottonwoods
producing the only shade in the desert
and the only soft.
An exhale floats through the sunlight
glittering through the leaves
Hauling out trash
embedded in embankments
And the only whisper through the wind that remains
is we’re so lucky.