8.5.15

It's always interesting "experiencing" a death, and I feel like there will be a lot of caveats to this, since we suck at talking about it. Someone passed away in my online circle. Did I "know" her? Not really, but there is such a funny thing about "knowing" people online you've never met, when sometimes those who we see every day don't have the same meaning. It doesn't make one type of acquaintance more real or more valid.

This person had been troubled, struggled with depression and mental health, and I'm sure more that I don't even know. These words were kicking around my head during the day, and while they are not about her, they are certainly for her.

8-4-15

The wind blows a hum

across the conch of my ear.

It is different from the clacking leaves

and insect legs.

It hints and reveals

in the heat of early August

like the dull song from the hive

or the faceless freeway.

Higher in the hills are arroyos still

under a pretense of green,

scarring and crossing their crooked limbs

triangulating with the sky,

extending antennae.

The South Fork makes a percussion

too, under the cement bridge.

It is a fainter, shallower echo.

But now I know the refrain

and I don’t have to pause and squint.

I heard it when the water was deeper,

but it is not gone.