Joshua Tree

excerpted from Road Movie 2000


Joshua Tree

snowing? what a surprise, not what I expected,
but I’m at 5000 ft. so it’s still cold, 3” up top at
the Ranger’s Station! Not quite ready for this reentry
to winter, I drove back down to Cottonwood Oasis
south a bit, to see if there was a temperature change

it was still really cold, clouds obscuring the sun
I was impatient to get out the paints,
nature is all change,
and the snow was gone by afternoon
the evidence gone, of what I saw, what

I felt-- at what I saw
these conventions we call Art,
they replace feeling, the oil paint itself,
a signal for something--
signal for authenticity?
THE REAL THING

I’m suspicious, self conscious already
becoming, hack painter? he thought
too much, what am I doing out here?
the plain air convention from France
through the American Regionalism
I was taught to be wary of--
but I’m conscious of all this

the Irony
Well, I’m just out here painting--
I love the adventure--






arms thrown up in ecstasy
twirling in the space, my religion
my art

one, one, one--



out painting, as the hero, in the Sun
stars
we’ve left the earth for second
order, tired of the endless silence,
the blank stare of the sky

It's amazing, I get out of the car,
and can see once again








one can see everything
and its relationship
with another,
rock, sand, wisp of grass

bush to bush
lizard here to there




bird call in the wind
I spot it over there
the lizard scurries

through there
t t t tracks of a tortoise
sun going down
sun coming up
I’m here to see it all

getting up from dream
to see the flower
way more amazing
than the thought, writing
it all down,