"Red Hills and Bones"

                                                                "Red Hills and Bones"
                                                                Georgia O'Keefe, 1941
                                                                                The Alfred Stieglitz Collection, 1949


It's soft here on this desert floor--
the first time I've felt soft
in my life.
       Maybe it's the non-doing
because I was undone
      and reduced to my elements
I gave a terminal sigh which was
                   caught in thin, dry air
                            and breezed downwind
                        carrying dust particles as my
                                        memory.

             I lay here,
             just bones,
             and I don't have to
            do. Anything.
The chase is over.
     I don't even remember
     resisting.
  Was I taken down
   quickly?
Or did I die throughout the night,
painting the sand auburn
  inch      by       inch,
the pool of my life spreading beyond
             my form?