Three Scenes from High Country in Spring

1.

I’ve never been more social
Than the landscape, at least not
Than as Lessard imagines

Landscape, collaborative
Art between humans
And nonhuman world.

I’ve often been less.
The hummingbird’s less disturbed
By snowmobiles roaring by

With men chattering
In lurid camo outfits
Than I am, not by the noise
But by the chatter

After they cut their engines.
There’s nothing to listen to
When words demand a hearing.

2.

I love listening
To a meadowlark singing
On an old fence post
In high desert in the spring.

Donne was correct in one sense:
Death dies with dying.
I’ll take one eternity
Free of being born again.

3.

It’s rich. The snowmobile’s stuck
In a snowy ditch.
How will we get out of this?

Two men try to solve the thing.
They gun the engine,
Shove in boards, and lever it.

No luck yet. The meadowlark
And hummingbird are memories
Already. There’s nothing left

In the air but fumes and roar
From the two-stroke combustion.
This is what back-country means.