Three Doors to Humboldt County

Door One

DEER LODGE TRAILER PARK

the rain... the rain...

The roots of fir trees twist slowly
and creep out over the soil.
Dark, leafy arms feather onto my trailer.
The wind is ten thousand passenger pigeons
flapping their wings as they land outside.

One by one, my neighbors tow their homes away.
Darkness gulps at their tail-lights.

Over the acres of quivering mud,
the toothless mouth of the sky hangs down.

Door Two

STONE LAGOON

The gate grates shut in the fog.
On the lagoon, a loon calls.

From the sky, wet syllables plunge
and vanish like snipe in the tules.

Black water laps; lurches; a figure
sways to its feet on the sandbar.

Monsters deep in an earthy sleep
cry out as old moods wake them.

Door Three

PARKING LOT AT DAWN

The dark speech of redwoods
prevails over the parking lot.
Two ravens slide like a glance
from the trees, their shadow
slipping over the man-made land:
ghost of a running boy.

Swirls of thrush song lift from leaves;
dawn is sliced by a flicker’s cry.
Through trackless miles of northwest fog,
saucers gliding low over forest
slowly pass the black, square ground
and turn; hover; safely touch down.

 

  — Deborah Finch