Cibola Sleeping
 
The Bears never came.
 
Last night, charcoal gray sky
Filled with stars, more stars
Than the eastern skies allow,
Watched over me as I climbed toward
Clearing to piss into the stillness
Of cool night at 3am,
 
Fire burnt down to embers.
 
I took a deep breath, 
Closed my eyes, tried to imagine
In the great emptiness, where I was, 
Where I had been, where I was going still,
What I had left, what I had to go back to—
I listened for any rustling in
The 1.6 million acre darkness beyond
 
The woods, ancient, tall, breathing,
Looked into my tired soul, 
 
I faded like falling stars in their stare.