Sky Island Whispered in my ear

SKY ISLAND WHISPERED in my ear

Sky Island, whispered in my ear, "i want you back." She is sweet with Cliff rose, aweets' al, her baby's cradle, blooming now. Her hair is the color of sunset, like ocotillo flowers,

the way water on sunlight catches your eye. Her hair sways in the wind and the bees are eager to taste her nectar.

Her arm pits are spicy with estafiate, bitter cherry and narrow leaf cottonwood. Her arms are aspen thin and strong, in late September

her hillsides are yellow with the leaves of osha and

aralia.

 Her kiss is bitter not easily given and not soon forgotten like the yellow inner bark of Mahonia.

 My mouth waters with aristolochia, I want to move and walk. I see far away, eyes and mouth cool and moist, the narrow leaf yucca across the canyon moving, behind me the

last of saguaro alone near the ridge, just below the two oaks.

She told me she is waiting with ceanothus, red root and choke cherry. She always makes promises like that, "'I'll give you this and that. Come take me, come inside, I'm yours.' "Jealous at times she won't let me return home, so i am dizzy and lost unable to go ahead or behind. Tired worn out and spent. I wish sometimes she would leave me alone so i could go back to Phoenix

 and see the bright lights of town. But as soon as I go back, she's there again, burning me with her eyes, sharp bitter burning like Anenome tuberosa, 

through the bones of my face, calling, "Come back. Come back to me.".
I go back to her, she is waiting like Mother Mary at the tomb. 

Waiting on the morning of the Pasch.
by Paul Manski