Autumn / Durango / Colorado
I see him as I walk the river Animus at sunset /
he looks in twilight / near the underpass of a bridge /
like a wraith lost in the crease between day and night /
one of many who call the river bank the only home
they know / I’m part way into the tunnel / when I hear
above the riverine swirl / haunting and other worldly /
the living breath / transfixing voice / of an Indian flute /
mournful / sonorous / spirit reaching / with rare grace /
to encircle the heart / I turn around / barely make out /
in light’s deepening dark / a Native flute’s elongated
throat trained at the stars / around its core / fingers
of one whose song stretches for the heavens / serenading /
who knows / the fates to change his own / I begin to walk
back / to applaud with a poet’s fervor the nameless /
wingless seraphim / but not before he melts into night /
notes doleful dissolving into Animas’ whispered /
shallowing cadences of fall
