Mud’s come

but you wouldn’t know it

until your foot is three inches deep.

Or, god forbid, your tire by far more.

That’s the thing about this place–

dry as the brown cracked skin lining the arroyos

but a certain season arrives

and the steady, hard, rocky road you’ve trusted

decides to gulp you and whatever force is moving you along

straight into its earthen gullet.

I can understand that kind of gluttony.

Maybe it’s best I slow down and prison-break my shoe.