Beyond this ledge a plateau
rippling stone cones and spires
capped in flat rock
rows of pink and orange
one behind the next
like lines
of soldiers
I think about you, father
standing at attention, hand raised
peaked white cap
officer military intelligence
airborne
I knew
almost nothing else
you rarely spoke
of those years
you never met combat you did
say that when we asked
you started smoking
in the Marines
later, the cancer
you were speechless, still
somehow you managed to
sing
from the Halls of Monte… to the hills of Tripo…
you don’t know
but I found photos once by mistake
when I was a child
saw them again
after you died a body
by the side of a road
not alive I felt mute too—
these hoodoos—
fairy chimneys—
do they cast magic?
voodoo?—
and this bee
almost frozen midair
its wings, their thin veins
like solder
holding them together
lifting it
the unlikely physics of
its suspension
perhaps like a helicopter carrying soldiers
carrying you—
its tiny
striped body
moored here
above my hand
where I’m sitting
on the edge of a ledge—
not where it should be flitting in blue
columbine ripe with pollen
I can’t help
see you
marooned unflinching