Weekends, we would drive the dirt roads south of Tucson,
those old washed-out tracks drug dealers
and human coyotes would use to smuggle their products across the border,
down near Arivaca where it’s said people go to disappear,
picking wild sage from the hillsides for you to bring home 
and dry and bundle into smudge sticks
for your empowerment ceremonies,
burning the sage while you chanted the mantra 
that would unravel the bond tying us one to the other. 

I often wonder if you’re happier now —
I hope so, for the pain of that unweaving to have been worthwhile —
and about the strong magic you must have mastered 
that keeps me, after all these years, smoldering for you.