we stopped along the side of
the winding, narrow two-lane road
that curved out of sight behind the next hill

you cut fresh sagebrush off the side of this arid mountain
it filled the car with the scent of wild outdoors
which followed us home, a thousand miles to the city

the road ended atop the pink mountains
these goliath witnesses of eons
watched the land run red with blood

the essence of the violence
that occurred in the valley below
had oozed and seeped into the soil

it radiated through the air and into the people
the place I had hoped would become our home
echoed too hollow and strange and empty