At Big Basin

Not til I am inside the nearest national forest,

standing outside a campground outhouse,

it’s walls pock-marked with moth parts,

do I know, that all that needs saying about you,

my constant sucker wound,

my subject matter, has, in fact, been said.

Now, there is this light

that ricochets and these trees

I can see up into, imagining a new year’s

green tips in tomorrows’ light, a brighter shade,

a solitary view of the basin.

Later, in the cool museum,

striped snakes long

in formaldehyde

while jays and finches perch

fist-sized, heartless on diagonals.

Outside your city, I am wildlife

pitched and jarred; I am old growth,

car windows on electric tracks.

I fill in landforms, move clear through

shelves of known creekbed, take

this highway with me home.