The Bay Candles

Coming up
from long underwater, still dark,

a snorting breath in the quiet
under the bridge.

The water ticks on the pylons;
outside, somewhere, the sun.

Play fair, they said. And as I climb
hand over hand, the beams creak,

and a kingfisher streak of sunlight
crosses my eyelids. Above, now,

leaves boil in the Spring wind,
and cotton glides to the roadbed.

I pitch over the rail, with the sky revolving,
my eyes still blurred with water,

and two feet, mine, land
on the wooden planks, prickled

with the long needles
of the ponderosas.

Say, dear, what odds now?
Your thick dark hair

smells of olives and
of bay candles on a snowy night;

we are never
in the right place,

we are never
at the right time.