Drag out books with dog-eared pages, find that
quote to make some sense of Adam and Eve,
the doctrine of apple trees and the real
story of knowledge. Take the apple not
just to eat, but cast the seeds and make sure
to spread them wide along the paths. Seek out
that birdsong found on an ipod matching
the birdsong from the lush cottonwood down
by the ditch, to know a Bullock’s Oriole.
Notice the canary-yellow bottom
of a brilliant white sego lily
balanced on its slender stalk. Truth rises
in spits and starts, our own bird call, a trill
of thought where the hummingbirds whirr and dive.

—

Michelle Holland has two collections of poetry, “Event Horizon,” included in The Sound a Raven Makes, (Tres Chicas Press) \ New Mexico Book Award winner 2009, and Chaos Theory, (Sin Fronteras Press).  She is co-poetry editor of the Sin Fronteras Journal, and treasurer of the New Mexico Literary Arts Board.