What if

If not for the smash of my knee

into the sliding glass door,

the patch of grit

on the country curve,

the overheard

conversation,

the desert windstorm

encrusting me in dust.

the birthday kiss,

the missed - assignation.

the secret mission

unexpectedly revealed.

the stillborn novel

reborn in stanzas,

the stolen camera,

the broken fence.

the little boy who said,

i didn't know that it was loaded.

the wallet lost

on a foreign train,

the rainy swerve

into the guard rail.

if the comet hadn't

smacked the Yucatan,

we might all

be clad in scales.

The quality of mercy is a nearly inexhaustible subject

Antonio Narbona was born

in Mobile, Alabama in 1773

when it was still part of

Spanish Louisiana.

There must be something

about some places that persists,

that gets into the blood.

In 1805, Lieutenant Narbona

led a troop of Spanish soldiers

up the north fork of Canyon de Chelly,

where they killed a hundred and fifteen

Navajo men, women, and children.

Took the thirty-three they spared

back to Chihuahua to serve as slaves.

At a big new grocery store

near the Canyon, in Chinle,

a leather-skinned man points

to his cap on which the word

Army has been stitched by a machine.

Says he's a vet, asks for money.

I say, me too and give him

half a sawbuck and half

a hoagie sandwich.

Two nights ago, after I got home,

the raccoons ate three newborn kittens.

Left their eviscerated bodies

on the driveway

next to the compost bins.

They spared one -or missed it.

Maybe they were satisfied

with just the three.