climbing among the weeds on a hot summer day

home isn’t much of a place to grow up

there’s nothing but dust

nothing but rude people and heat,

and the cold wind that howls in the winter

the tumbleweeds on the highway, the coyotes in the streets

i didn’t grow up in home

but i became who i am there

i became who i am scrambling over black porous rock

driving under the sights of the sky

horizon to horizon

wide and open

i became who i am among the scraggling weeds

the dry bushes

the thorny knots

in wide concrete ditches

that were never full

in baking pavement streets

because there

there is nothing to distract you from yourself

there is nothing

to keep you from facing yourself

other than perhaps

the momentary occupation

of seeking

shade