A Type of Scene

Small, sunny morning cacophony
Of the house finches, wrens, and kingbirds
In the prickly pear and junipers

And a couple of neighbors talking
Quietly, crossing the parking lot,
Concerning illness and survival.

These were facts, events happening, some
Of what was going on that morning
In that corner of a tourist town.

A propeller plane droned overhead
While black-chinned hummingbirds squeaked and hummed.
You see the deception here, don’t you?

Be they never so confessional—
Lyric poets and memoir writers
Who report on the facts of their lives—

Be they never so conscientious,
Intimate, precise, and accurate,
They can’t catch experience in words,

Only trigger your own memories,
From which you draw a vivid picture
(Or a dull one, which you don’t care for)

Of whatever scenes their words describe.
Types of scenes distinguish the writers,
But never capture the writers’ lives.