SOUTH YOSEMITE: ALL THE WORLD MOVING IN HUNGER

In the morning
a bear crossed the trail
ahead of us, passing
silently, the berries
on its breath
fogging into the air.

In the afternoon
a pair of sunburnt couples
gingerly shouldered their packs
and left their perch
above the falls
to search for pizza
in the valley below.

After bathing in the
pools between the falls,
            reading Snyder 
and listening to the water hum,
we looked for the places
it broke through the
            granite,
licking the rock away.

We chose a graveled ledge,
slightly off the trail.
Wawona Dome hung orange
in the dusk across the
violent tongue of Chilnualna falls.

Limping with soreness
we made our meal– Indian food 
boiled in foil packets,
spread over cous-cous,
washed down with whiskey
and the first starlight
as the sun sank down 
over the orchards
of the central valley.

It’s then we heard
the cheeping of the
woodpecker chicks
and saw the silhouette 
of their many mouths 
jutting from a hole in a 
pine grey and long dead.

They started as the mother flew up
to scout the tree– as if their hunger
            could mute
the dangers of the world–
and they didn’t let up
until all the food she carried
was shoved down their loud throats
and she dove down the cliff for more.

Michael J. Galko is a scientist and poet who lives and works in Houston, TX. He was a finalist in the 2020 Naugatuck River Review and the 2022 Bellevue Literary Review poetry contests. Recent poems have appeared or will appear in New Plains Review, Spillway Magazine, Hole in the Head Review, Atlanta Review, and Boudin, among other journals.