then i know why i carry a camera

 

when i find sonoran dawns

and walk gently on a desert cracked

by prairie dogs whose mounds

can suck you – in

up to your crotch

and waken snakes once quiet under

tumbleweed

but now that wind full speed

at you immobilized in sand

alive with racing heart soon

forgetful of the wild upwind pigs

and stone – scratched petroglyphs.

 

this then is when

i know why i carry a camera.

 

J Paul Lisseck, Amherst