Wrong Metaphors

The usual cottonwoods,
Junipers and prickly pear,
Bicyclist on the dirt road,
Mule deer browsing in the shades,
Cliffs crumbling into canyons
Slower than organisms
Die, faster than species' lives.

The breeze compounded of breath,
Souls, ashes, bacteria,
And waters of centuries
Whisked around this centrifuge
Does a fine job of mixing
Cliffs, deer, roots, excrescences
Of lost civilizations

Despite the great differences
In density between these.
Somewhere a folio fades
In a library of dust
And whispers, wrong metaphors:
"It was holde to neih the fire
And is molten al awey."