Traveling to Arizona | snapshot poem

flat-bottomed clouds, piled high
ice-cream scoops in a blue dish

home-made chocolate sryup
wind chimes singing

what is fundamental? what
is superfluous?

mockingbirds, cactus wrens,
hummingbirds at the sugar water

a woman, forgotten, in an outdoor cage
heat waving up from the pavement

the thin & frightened girl, wild-eyed,
weighing in for chemotherapy

recliner chairs and IV stands
row after row

palm trees recently pruned
looking entirely artificial

a different mother, the consequence
of some spontaneous transformation

parchment skin, brittle bones,
charcoal bruises beneath the eyes

plaster rabbits, plastic geese,
rubber dinosaurs on a green gravel lawn

unfamiliar flowers, thick and brilliant
fleshy plants with thorny warnings

waiting rooms, benches, vinyl walls
petals on the surface of the pond