1.
Easy-living where troughs and faucets leak,
where Cottontails lounge in the gooseneck’s
dust and shade with ground squirrels and quail—
Roadrunners pause and pass with limp lizards,
nest bound. A smear of downhill color
horses graze and walk around to water,
the only monkeyflowers left in the dry,
short-cropped grass, a beacon of smells
below the bellied tank bleeding tears
from a shank of hanging moss, reaching
for muddied ground—it drips,
as it dripped for years, crying for repairs.
2.
The ground comes alive with the scurry
of baby squirrels, Bobcats streak
and Ravens feast in the distance, even
the house cat forsakes fresh dirt—impacts
from the infrastructure of gophers
under construction, undermining
lawn and garden—for an easier catch.
Pinchers and tails of scorpions piled
in the guano of bats beneath the eaves
where ants pack the leftovers off—our eyes
are peeled for black widows and snakes—
for easy-living where wild congregates.
