One is the truest number.

There are moments when I am awake

When across the street

Secreted in saguaro

I can feel my nestlings

Tumble beneath the damp down

Of my underbelly

I spread my wings wide, arching

Within our covert striated feather tips

Touching the carved cavern of cactus

Flesh, to protect them.

My nipples burst forth as bougainvillea

Blossoms

Fluorescent

Florid

Grinning at the sun

The ironwood of my spine bends

Patiently, joyfully as

Spring siroccos tangle my

Limbs and the keening scents of

My twisted green wood spices the crackling

Air

The cerulean plentitudes, expanding and

Contracting through night and day

Are my lungs

My breath is the fragrance of cholla

Nectar

Jasmine

Maple syrup

Vanilla

Frankincense

I forget myself, drawn away by the clamor of cell phones and keyboards, the clash of wills, the lamenting desire of my lonely heart, the exaltation of acquisition, the fearful grasping for acclaim, the ambition pounding in my head, the fervor of my cat tormenting a lizard, the innocence of such violence, the filth of news…

I understand I have been asleep, deluded by my own nightmare.

I am a lizard, thoughtless of my bloody stump,

The sun pulses through my veins

Under my hot scales.

I am myself again.