Work in progress

I had a beautiful walk tonight with Claytie up Echo Mountain in Alta Dena, and I was overwhelmed on that walk with a monster of a poem that is in rough draft form and over three pages long right now. It's not done and I'm going to work on it some more tomorrow, but here is an excerpt to prove I really am working on something for the day.

* * *

The sun going down too fast, careless, sloshed

pink and orange toward us, all over the sky.

I wanted to see it from the top, where I could look the other way and see the simultaneously rising

moon,

wanted to run but paralyzed

by the paint-dripping clouds

soft and blurry overhead,

sharp in the distance,

fog or smog reddening the distant city’s cheeks

so that I thought it looked

like it might cry.

It’s okay, I wanted to say,

it’s only spilled paint

the stars will clean it up

I wanted to run up the mountain, worried about missing the climax

I wanted to stop and take in the sun from each lookout point on the way

I settled for a brisk walk up, pausing when the beauty made me pause,

knowing that each moment I enjoyed from the mountainside

was costing me a moment bathed in light at the top.

knowing the show that was so overwhelming right here

would be even better somewhere else.