1 because the moon comes straight up from the mouuntain like the hidden possibility of madness escaped for everyone to see and the wandering stars who are said to rule our lives wander on in darkness I feel a need to lie down among the stones and caress any of them who have survived 2 I always looked for what I wanted in the wrong places until the desert taught me to want what I found now on summer nights I sit in the garden where it is hot and dry and young stones grow like weeds when the moon turns a mad white face upon me having nothing to offer I hold up my empty hands it is so easy to be happy 3 this morning a woodpecker woke me practicing on his drum and all afternoon cicadas rang like the telephones I haven't answered I am what has become of me a man who lives in the desert where coyotes wail more skillfully than hired mourners at the funeral of an Eastern king where every night the stars whose light I have not earned and will never deserve return as if to keep a promise and even the rain when it falls is coming home