In the first flourishes of red light 

the rush of wind takes the last 

of the leaves into the ditch. 

I am standing in the medicine wheel, 

a garden cornered by cottonwoods,

while the moon, waning crescent, hangs

a cocked smile east.

House finches shoot like Leonids,  

flashing in the crooked birdbath,

its cratered face a moon of it's own, leaning,

the one I've been meaning to fix,

the pedestal too heavy to lift on my own.

East. East they will ride the thermals, 

wings jostling like heartbeats.  

Soon the sun will cast 

my long shadow across the grass again,

eclipsing all of the earth I can.

Somewhere the dog is asleep on the deck.  She is dreaming.

Somewhere the wife is drinking hot tea.

When the mist touches the trees,

it touches the sky, becomes one--

I breathe in.