Eclogue: Las Vegas

They say it’s all designed to look like water.
Every handmade mountain has at its source
a spring. A grackle, too, would be seduced,
or a coyote, or a cow. We share this
with our cousins in the desert, a feeling
for the distant glimmer saying: Live.
Steal a morsel from the greedy sky.

I am thirsty here. The air drinks me.
I cannot stop my hands from cracking; I see
out on the mountains my own skin, unrolled
in wrinkled sheets. I picture veins of silver
building glyphs beneath the fractal desert,
a river from which pails of city bones
were drawn, and drawn, and drawn unto depletion.

Every handmade mountain wears a river
on its face. Every face is looking
for a river to plunge into. Every river
sinks at last into the dust. Before
we hollowed out the mountains, they were quick.
Water flashes in the gorgeous night:
I stand between you and your final death.

Fountain of the Gods at Caesar’s Forum Shops, Las Vegas, NV