Mea culpa

Mea culpa

These are the ripe days of fat purple figs, 
when hornets and warblers feast 
among leaves broad as spread-fingered hands.

These are the parched days of red clay in the wind, 
red sand in the sky, and on the horizon, 
the orange glow of forests burning, 
of choking smoke watering the eyes. 

On the woodland’s edge, a deer stands
russet-orange as the baked clay, the wind-blown sand, 
the fire-glow in the west,

and I weep tears of impotence, 
my spread-fingered hands dry as the bones of the river, 
unable to hold back the ravening flames,
sorry, falling through the cracks in my voice..