A dim light shines fiery to the west
of this mountain ridge. My first view
came on a clear Spring day. The distances
looked immense. Mt. Diablo faraway
and rising out of a smoggy haze,
the blue edge of the horizon and the Pacific.
Did the pioneers imagine the Pacific
when they reached this point west?
I see golden poppies and a cloudy haze
in mid-summer. A clear view
of Melones, its fingers pointing away
at farmland in the distances.
That my eyes can see these distances
is amazing. At rest, peaceful, Pacific,
words that sound softly and faraway.
Like the Miwuk or the pioneers moving west
to California. They saw another kind of view,
and traveled different roads? Who sees through the haze
of history? This evening it’s a blue haze
on the mountains and in the empty distant
sky the first stars come into view.
Somewhere over the Pacific
an airliner flying out of the west
looks bright and faraway.
Reluctantly, I will move away
toward home as the heat and the haze
of evening darkens the valley west
of Doud’s Hill. And all across the horizon
the cool air off of the Pacific
and the lights of the cities coming into view,
this panoramic view.
Dusk is enough to take me away
from who I am and know the Pacific
as a place that lies beyond the haze
of our existence, to the distances
that illuminate forever in the west.
I love to look west at the view
where the distances stretch faraway
into the haze above the Pacific.
