Driving Back From Santa Barbara

Driving Back From Santa Barbara

I drive past peanut brittle
bones under wild brush
buried. Road work
roaring over the sea
as emerald as ivory.

The shadows
of the trees on pavement
like foam on waves,
the slow-motion flexing
of nature's muscles.
The sun sets like an eyelid
after an unnoticed day.

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The drive back at night,
the dark ocean, beckons me
with lights on oil rigs.
Calling me to a life on water
spent only looking
at the horizon, not the coast.

The unopened book, my passenger,
is a planet.