As Is

Roaring windy afternoon
On the mesa, and the cliffs,
Pines, and canyons do that thing,

Throwing voices, bellowing
In deep, throaty rushes, like
Pickup trucks and jet planes

Just over the horizon,
Confusing the listener
Who stands in an empty road

And sways. If it’s hard to tell
The winds from your machines now,
Imagine how difficult

Analogies must have been
Before fossil-fueled engines.
Winds could be armies of gods,

Ancestor spirits, demons,
Beings that living humans
Could fear projected in air.

How unlike life unlife is,
How much more like your machines.
There is no organism.

There is only the movement,
The pure roar of displacement,
Always what wasn’t as is.