Salty Canyon Caves Poem by Herbert Nehrlich

It was a silent move,
felt as a gentle stir
and pointed to the gate,
a portal freshly mown
and cured by brine
that seeps at times
in memory of awe.
No guards looked on
a breeze played lovingly
with flaccid skin
bestowing ripples
to the blushing flesh,
a swell, expanding now,
preparing for events
that make up sounds
and forest smells
surrounded by the heat
exploding from within,
a desert storm soon raged
huge drops of yellow rain,
the scent of phosphorus
mixed with ammonia salts,
and as the music fades away
the welcome sight of froth,
whitecaps of hope and connaissance,
as lava oozes from within
toward the flower's mouth
a pouting pink, exposed
in peristaltic waves
of thirst and pent-up greed.
The push comes from the flank,
strategic moves by chance,
new territory found and swept
now free of mines and traps
and conquered with a force
that grew from humble roots,
inside light shades of flax
that looked like willow leaves.
A bridge across the spring,
eternally fed from the stony depth
of secret salty canyon caves.