The sky bleeds
from the savage arteries of morning.

Redwoods swaying in the wind
make rachet sounds
like the clocks that tick inside bombs.

Then we hear it.
Echoing far up the canyon
whose chert outcrops rise
strata on strata
like a geologist’s open tombs.

The vaporous whinnies of engines!

Jets clutching in their talons
bushels of arrows.
Their limp bodies gone rigid in death.

Startled bluejays screech & rage.
Does, fat with young, crouch instinctively
amid buckbrush & manzanita.

While
underneath the earth’s fierce beauty
the spirit volcanoes of Big Sur
pretend sleep.

Somnambulists poised in their silos
gathering up like deadly amanitas
the magma of centuries.