JENNIFER L. KNOX

The Aqueduct's Up There Somewhere

Lie down someone said and I fell asleep
under the only tree around for miles:
a scrawny thing but sprawling—purple
wood, low to the ground, more bramble
than branches. There were houses hidden
in the canyons, I'd dreamed many times
of a white one with green shutters sunk
into a sandy dune along the San Andreas.
Under the tree I dreamed you were living
there in one of the upstairs rooms; you knew
I was waiting but wouldn't come out, and I
awoke, then, covered in seeds. Had they fallen
from the tree? It looked a long time gone
to be giving up seeds. What would they let
loose on my desert? What kind of unfamiliar,
thorny thing? The word murderous came
straight to mind: for all I knew, and all I had
yet to imagine.