Four gossips stand
whispering in a wind
only you can interpret.
Their collective solitude
settles on your smile
like fine red dust.

Your soul rests
innocently before
the vertical judgments
of Courthouse Towers
and voiced silences of home
reveal fossils in you
that only lovers know.

And the dark angel
I had feared disappears
in the lust of a canyon
baked in lavendar.