Daniel E Haislet

i entered this desert
with you
a voyeur 
as a cool morning in june
tapered toward midday
when we found a wide spot
for a piss among the baked sage
sage citrus piss and decay
found cut into the sand
rails one can’t see
from the moiré throughfare
found too that graffiti-
splashed boxcars
divide the rose-glass
horizon
that once drove firm 
men to madness
to death before someone
had sense enough
to name it mirage
— even in this wasteland
some ancient hermit savant 
knew naming a thing
makes a thing
less a thing —
before my mother’s
father’s brothers
plugged their ears
with copper ore
lashed themselves
to gambling debt
to arizona whores
and sonoran tequila
the stern north
and the newly named thing
the dancing double-
glazed lead-light
safely starboard
and voyeur
even as i write it
i know i’m too soft
for the mines
too dim for madness
but you see me
pining for it all