Berkeley, California

		Souls are en route

to their rest this hour. I sit with my share
of solitude, culling books to lighten
my load, at peace with endings on earth. 
A world away, the farm looms in me,

smell of honey and itch of timothy, 
the mare's muzzle at my neck, the sun 
bedding down in the neighbor's field
as the distant highway moans. 

		More than nostalgia— 

my life calls me home. Duties await me 
there, burials under the brittle pecan  
where the grass overgrows and the gates 
are left open. Of all my belongings

this weathered map tells my ways.
I pack my things, humming old hymns
of release as dusk dissolves to evening.

This is the hour creatures come close:

		The horses have ambled

into the lot for the night. At the trough 
they nose the water's surface, waking a bit
in the new chill—now that day is done
and the air has grown rare and precise.