Show Some Mercy Today

Yellowing swath, rusting grass punctuated by parched palms, antiqued bovines accustomed to the Cascade haze, rough branches blooming wispy antennae, sunflower fields, the colors of a distant past passed over by suicidal pilots spreading death to give life, neat rows bearing - ? Electric wires and fencing, stained beams of bruised wood, the sterile scent of air conditioning. Blown bits of tire rubber on the highway. Cramped legs, yawning endlessly past Yolo county line, this morning my first mountain - head held white-faced above clouds. The night was undulating exchange of sky and hill, rolling black wave, positive and negative equal so the road flipped and we rode upside down to San Fransisco, refusing gravity to observe the scattered lite-brite bulbs of sleepy mountain towns - or were those stars? Rain starved creek bed, blackbird insomniac wandering, afraid to rest ahead where there's walls enough for all. Scorched and sun-weary, skyscrapers on the horizon. Drops enough for each blade of grass, thirst enough to see miles past. Indicating a soft shoulder, sensitive roadways bid caution to the heavy lids - red balloon announcement overhead. Slow and prepare to stop - in every city, skeletons reaching toward the sky, exposed steel shivering. Spiderweb of railways and dusted tire tracks leading anywhere, beginning

- Sacramento