The Field

We came home
to the high desert where
the moonlines around
the clouds are so
sharp they etch the sky
and the land is
turbulent with sagebrush
creased with pink arroyos
mottled by piñon,
each hill piebald under
the shadows of thunderheads.
I carried my four-month-old
through my father’s field
along sunny mud walls.
At first I pointed,
saying the names of things–
bee, red willow, crab apple–
then I thought, what’s the hurry
in naming the world?
How must it be now
in the wordless embrace
from which she has gathered
into form for a moment?
There is so short a time
when an olive branch is
a shoal of fish is
the edge of a dream.
We can save naming
part conquest and part romance
for a little while.
Let’s not sunder ourselves
from this mother but
dip tiny fingers
in the honey of
the space between.