Bibliography

Where is this rock?
I know.
I took the picture.
It was in early April, 2003.
The Iraq War was in its invasion phase.
Johnny Mata, of Pecos, Texas,
Was still alive.
So was Lauri Pestiwah, of Tuba City, AZ.

I stood and looked at this rock.
It’s out in the high desert of New Mexico.
Not so far from Trinity, where the first A-Bomb was tested.
It is part of a library, 2500 images, 25,000?
On these smooth black rocks,
With snow capped mountains behind and to the east.
Beyond the mountains, Texas.

The US Government knows this rock too.
It’s in a National Monument, staffed with an old geezer from Connecticut.
Who comes out west to sit in a trailer and talk to folks,
Who loves this off-road spot, and smokes his cigarettes.
“I seen a rattler up there the other day,” he coughs.
“Watch yr step.”

I look at this picture on my computer.
I feel like I found this book.
I feel like I was there, in its unknown celebration.
Wood smoke. Meat. Moon. Stars.
Or maybe a message about the big city way to the Northwest:
Chacco.
And their beautiful women.

I give the old guy a dollar.
I’m too cheap to buy a souvenir.
The stuff doesn’t look too real either,
After my walk in the library on the hill.

The rock stays in my mind.
And I meanwhile reside in someone else’s
Ones and zeros, centralized
Datafied, reminders, like these rocks too.
Just in case.

--silk hope, 5/16/06