Given the unique layout of this poem, we suggest reading it on a computer screen or in the landscape orientation on your phone. Even so, depending on the size of your phone, line breaks may occur that adversely affect the look and experience of the poem.

In order to view the poem as the author intended it to appear, we strongly encourage you to click on this link (which will take you to a PDF): August Morning on the Mesa After Rain

August Morning on the Mesa After Rain
David Meischen

among dried grasses
a palette of muted green
crosshatched as if by feathers

seed heads frothing


raindrop-sparkled
basalt extrusions
blackened
by the burn
of time


in the bowl of the city
below
acrid haze

west of here forests are burning


promontory boulders mid-tumble

I study the angle of repose
rocks jut
refusing rest


among petroglyphs
fresh growth of the chamisa

whispers of the ancient ones

—
A Pushcart nominee, with a personal essay in Pushcart Prize XLII, David Meischen is the author of Anyone’s Son, winner of the John A. Robertson Award for Best First Book of Poetry from the Texas Institute of Letters (TIL). David has twice received the Kat Cattarulla Award for Best Short Story from TIL, most recently for “Crossing at the Light,” lead story in The Distance Between Here and Elsewhere: Three Stories (Storylandia, Summer 2020). His work has appeared in The Common, Copper Nickel, The Evansville Review, Salamander, Southern Poetry Review, The Southern Review, Valparaiso Fiction Review, and elsewhere. A former juror for the Kimmel Harding Nelson center for the arts, David completed a 2018 writing residency at Jentel Arts. Co-founder and Managing Editor of Dos Gatos Press, he lives in Albuquerque, NM, with his husband—also his co-publisher and co-editor—Scott Wiggerman.

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