Sound returns
The Earth was Mars-red
before sight or taste, before memory.
and rocks reached out from hills
Sound bends its way in,
in knuckle forms. I saw every layer
palming hands around my cochlea,
in the dried and punished sediment—
cupping the fragile shell and pointing
the highway sped out to the desert edge.
down my ear canal with racket.
And like that wind which wore
shapes into uplifted stones
chatter reaches in to pull me back.
Voices in the room
whip around and pin me
to a place that I have seen before.
Words come in gusts and sandblasts—
My Name, wake up, My Name, you have to wake up.
That wind keeps up its clatter—
I answer: Yes, I’ve been to Zion.
I’m blown back to a scrub teal canyon.
I find my hands.
The walls have forgotten about clocks
so I start to wind my own.
