Stephen Sutherlin - Poet, Musician, Designer

The Desert
The Desert Hills
The Desert Hills are calling me
Dark Mesa
Called the Pedernal
Whose proud form has stood
Damn near eternal,
Watches over the sand stone cliffs
Across the valley as sage scents drift
From the scorched earth
Of a July day on Piedre Lumbre

I watched the Big Dipper rise
And Orion set
As the stars
Spun ’round
Above my head

The stones
Tall Figures
Holding council in the dark
While firelight dances
And waves and arcs.

The birdsong is quiet
And held close to the ground
In this otherwise silent
Place with small sounds.

Just the occasional coo
Of a mating white dove;
The cries of the crows
As they pass above.

Everything here is over your head
The Stars
The Birds
The Rocks
Who once said,
“Not even we will stand
For Eternity in this land.”

Chaco, Chaco
Pueblo, pueblo
Solar and lunar
Casting shadow
Crossed perfect symmetry
Over generations
Passing down
Great calculations
To one day build
A night full of houses
That track the Sun
As it falls and rises
To follow the Moon
As it waxes and wanes
Over eighteen years
Of coming and goings
Houses full of empty rooms
For ghostly guests
Not even tombs
For no body rests
In the broken vessels
Of offerings made
To the ancestors travels
North to South
Down roads that unravel
After countless miles
Chaco, Chaco
Pueblo, pueblo
The presence of The Peoples
Persists through the morrows

I look up
Into the night sky
Looking back into
The history of the universe
This mystery I see
A thousand stars
And clouds of dust
Presented to me
From long, long ago
And just a fragment
Not even a whole
Arm of the galaxy
For it unfolds
Well beyond the sky
That sits on the horizon
Before my small eye
A dizzying array
In the dark, dark desert
This bright reminder
Of how dark and small
I am
On this ball of dust
And water
Spinning out into an eternity
Of history
With the possibility that
Empires are falling
Before my eyes like
Stars caught in the greater
Gravity of a singularity

The blue screen won’t load
The news is old
The fire is hot
The coffee is cold

I must be in the right place

The wind whistles through the trees
The air wheezes as I breathe
The dirt is dirty with blackest soot
The trees have fallen exposing roots

I must be in the right place

I am in the write place
With time to think
And craft this space
With smoke in my eyes there’s time to blink

I must be in the right place

With many miles and tires worn
My skin the sun seeks to absorb
The camp is set, the children fed
No fingers, smashed, no nothing bled

I must be in the right place

Into the woods
The end of summer
Into cold morning
A gleeful glimmer
of a night without incident…
Nothing to prevent
Our awakening
of senses, primordial
Long forgotten, guttural
need for fire and food.

A great horned owl
awakens me from my
darkened state
with the call to its mate
to breakfast.
Brings my morning thoughts around
to the food we hauled up
off the ground
into a tree to ward
off bears out hungry.

A long winding walk, heavy
packs but light thoughts
down to the river’s edge we made.
With campfire rings and
the desire to sing
we make tales of what
adventure bring.

Longitudinal Awareness
Not really a thing —
Not spatial, more sensory
The open capillary of mental exercise
A receptor that activates once in the wild
A slower foot, a surer step
Knowing that it is too quiet
While noting every sound.
The calls of the creatures
No room for mistakes, so
you lay awake wondering if it
be predator or varmint
Alive
Open
Receiving
Consciousness
Ready for the surprises
Except for your own
Mental illness