Trails

I live in Southern California,

amid a landscape of Mediterranean climate and desert influences,

where it is manicured by many mixtures in themes

like Mother Nature couldn’t make up her mind

what it was supposed to look like when it finally was finished.

 

There are stretches of empty fields

bordered by rows of Eucalyptus trees,

nearby some tall palms stand in their towering presence

as well as the occasionally groups of pines.

 

They all surround the neighborhoods

that have modest homes and ranches on same blocks,

so you can have families with old cars

next to those with horses

creating an eclectic environment

with no one is concerned about the lack of harmony

making it truly is normal to see

somebody feeding their horse

beside a clothes line covered in diapers.

 

They ride off on some trail they invent

across yards or the vacant lands,

only map is the one written in the head.

 

It is in the middle of this causal devotion to scenery

often I go for a bicycle ride

following the streets that go down to the river

leading to an asphalt trail that stretches for miles,

which slices through a panoply of sites

from golf course and cemeteries

to the sewer treatment plant and local park.

 

In the river’s water I see the same white heron

standing there in all his feathered beauty

seeming so out of place in all that streaming liquid

surrounded by the Kelly green thickets of foliage

and some clumps of bamboo.

 

Just another day in an environment

subtly expressing its contrary essence,

happily making my own path through its many scenes.