Summer in the Mojave

The passage to Heaven is a sandy slope.

The weeds carve rings
where the wind has whipped them.

We watch a jackrabbit skim
over the golden waves
as the sun sinks red.

The sand scorches my feet
through the soles of my boots.

***

The passage to Heaven is a sandy slope.
I cry on the ascent. My legs are aching,
I am ashamed. We came all this way.

I pull myself over the crest at last light.
My lungs burn. He is waiting for me.

***

The stars punch holes in the sky,
one by one, sapping the dying
sun. The whole world is noiseless.

We watch the sky for meteors.
We argue. He says we are looking
into the past. I say we are looking
into a graveyard. Does the Universe
have a center?

(It does not.)

***

Daybreak is a pale aura over the distant
crags when we rouse ourselves.

Heaven sings to us all the way down,
a deep hum, like God's tinnitus, like
blood rushing in the world's ears.

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