Last Day Age 56

Pelican commuters fly 

South to their night homes 

Flock after flock 10, 21, 45, 100’s, 1,000+? 

Mostly flapping, often soaring 

Elegant and efficient flyers Pterodactyl heads 

Maneuvering like boat rudders 

Do they have relatives in the flocks I watched for decades

At the tip of Baja California by El Tule arroyo? 

I think of the pelicans of Bahia de Los Angeles 

Lined up on the morning shore of an island 

Webbed feet inches from the water 

Each with equal elbow room between its neighbors 

Watching me motor by in a small boat  

Their heads one by one tracking me 

Wondering if I have any fish for them 

Or thinking ancient dinosaur thoughts? 

A single pelican does a 180 back to the north 

Flying against the flocks all headed south 

Maybe wanting another fish meal before dark?

Or searching for a flock mate? 

Wanting to be Johnathon Livingston seagull 

Doing something different? 

Below the pelicans inches from the ocean 

Wave after wave of tiny seabird flocks 

Pointy small beaks, short necks 

Fast and frantic flappity flapping 

Tiny black mysterious outlines with the setting Sun behind 

I wait for the green flash as the Sun sets 

Sea lions talking all at once 

Barking about their day 

Barking about the coming night 

Bark, bark, bark and bark some more 

Mist begins to rise from the shore 

No more flashing Sun from house windows 

On the Santa Lucia Mountains behind us 

Point Sur Rock miles away blends into the darkening mountains 

 ** 

Time see-saws back and forth 

I pick out in the last light 

Layers of sediments along a trail 

Sand, smooth river rocks, clay dust, and gravel 

Once all above in the mountains 55 Million years ago 

I look for sea otters 

Curling into the kelp for the coming night 

Here for perhaps as long as 65 million years 

A gray hard rock under my feet was once 

Orange red bright like the setting Sun 

Plumes of magma rising to the surface 80 million years ago 

The bell tolls at the Carmel Mission 

A wavering sound bounced between sea and shifting air 

Only since June 3, 1770 

Hearing tourists speaking languages from around the world 

Echos of the long gone otter hunters and whalers 

All seeking the California Dream 

 ** 

Why have I never been here before? 

This place til today was always a whiz-by 

Blasting by in a car to somewhere else 

We humans wait silently in small groups or alone 

Socially distanced, Bat Flu masks at the ready 

Staring in the chill at the setting Sun

The Sun sinks below the Pacific Ocean 

Time stands still 

This day here and now 

One last solar flare 

At the Sun's 11 o’clock edge 

A blast of solar wind 

Silently racing somewhere 

The last pelican commuters fly by fast 

Their mysterious tiny seabird shadows far below 

Racing to night roosts 

The waxing gibbous Moon rises behind the mountains 

A ghostly white turns bright yellow 

I pick out the Sea of Tranquility 

Remembering finding it with my Dad 

Through branches of an old walnut orchard tree 

The night Neil and Buzz slept there July 21, 1969 

I spread out my arms wide 

Fingertips touching the Moon and the fading dusk 

Point Lobos 

Sea Lion Cove 

Alta California