If the End of the World
through an open window
smoke settling in the leaves
like a bell ringing
Coming Across A Horned Toad
when I saw a horned toad
watch wildfire on juniper corpse
its eyes mattered pitched
and smoldered open
its name echoed small blood
a room full of breathing
a fire-caught voice
the body is a river is a body
horizon shrouded suddenly
tongue carried into mountain
into memory veined dusk bone spur
a moon trail touch-lit
another cathedral
another paint coat cracking
another
another
I have a tin can for sky
settled in open prisms
prisms between storm
and a god
I still see clouds still
over valley dirt afternoons
in December
when evening turns a dark shore
everything tall
through the pinons
I take note
because it comes back
comes lunar becomes
ash altered in spilled morning
because bloom
because white trees
because rope soot
a river's winded teeth
placid silver
and ankle-deep
under baptized skies
of black dirt
I hear morning
shell blue
and there a horned toad
its skin its flat time
its spine its arrowhead
pollen on its back
or is it sleet rain
braiding along
a dense prayer
I carry morning
_______________________
Jake Skeets
Horses
Milkweed Editions 2026
