An Offering
Before light dawns in our junipered air
Orion passes over the house
and I say a raincrossed prayer
to breathe like the horses
leaning against each other
in the desert corral,
one’s ear in the tangled mane
of the other’s back.
There is the stirring of wind,
their roan coats turning pink.
Though you sleep in another house,
I want you to come to me.
Take off your shoes, enter this place
where the stars disappear in the rose light.
Do not be afraid, love, of my love.
Only the gentlest sound, the beginning of time,
the horses speaking at night,
truly separates us.
And that is nothing at all.
To enter into desire, what the heart wants,
is to ask what the heart can give.
Maybe it is only as small as a shell, the imprint
of a hoof or leaf ribbed into a rock you might
bring me from the floor of this sandstone valley.
Maybe it is deeper than the night sky,
richer than the apricot dawn.
Do not wait any longer.
I will touch the sound of your hair.
I will breathe in the presence of your eyes.
I will ask you who you truly are.
I will make of myself the smoothest air,
the duff of the most ancient piñon tree
to fill your hands, feed your spirit,
something so quiet, so known
that you must come to me.
