Five Miles Past Hana
There’s a limestone coral church on a hillside
five miles or so past Hana, on Maui.
Lying on a step to the door, slightly ajar,
an old Lab, sleeping, its graying muzzle resting
on outstretched legs, a tattered ear twitching
as if he is dreaming of youth, or death,
but whichever, he is content,
you can hear it in his breathing.
In the tiny vestibule at the back
of the shadowy church is a ledger—
visitors’ names and dates, hometowns—
filled to overflowing, no spaces left for you.
Beyond the red hibiscus behind the church
a wind sighs up through lacy evergreens at this cliff’s edge,
a distant swoosh of waves on sand and rock below.
In a churchyard off to the side, a gravestone
flat upon the earth, with wilting glads and mums:
Charles A. Lindbergh, 1902-1974.
Smooth sea stones surround the marker, neatly.
You have found his chosen place,
and now you stand at this road’s end,
the brink of the world. From some
precipice a mourning dove coos.
The surf murmurs, then quiets
with twilight and the magenta sky.
First published in The Voice, Vol. 2, 2010
Republished in Trajectory, Fall 2014