There was always somebody calling down to us
from a window high above
saying “get the hell away from here with that ball”
saying “you break my window, I’ll break your neck”

When you arrive, kayetesi smiles and holds
your hand and doesn’t complain about having

to take the plates off the table or put away
the food that’s been waiting—getting cold

In a hot attic with black garbage bags
taped over the windows and
model hot wheels booming power cosmic
are fantasies about kung fu practitioners
on the path to the distant volcano.

Gentle fingers, ferns
wiping away sweet summer sky.
Her day painted long
on freckled brown limbs,
grass and dew and honey bees.
She smelled of sweat, dusty earth,
rubbed into creases warm.

Going up the Rangling Road
I see an infestation of bamboo
that threatens all the other vegetation.
This is serious,
my gardening friend tells me.

He gathers rocks, stones
from mountain’s top, ocean low
mined deep
volcano’s core
in captured fire, flame,
held hot
between his willing
hands

I scare a kid by sitting at her table,
and I hear you when I think at her
get out, you high school cafeteria geek.

You, the wild girl,
And I, with my headache relievers,

I want to whisper things
that no one would ever send in a text message,
not for profundity or profanity
but because they are too common
to read on a screen.