Manzanita
Before dawn the coyotes
	weave medicine songs
	dream nets – spirit baskets –
	milky way music
		they cook young girls with
		to be woman;
	or the whirling dance of
	striped boys –

At moon-set the pines are gold-purple
Just before sunrise.

The dog hastens into the undergrowth
Comes back panting
Huge, on the small dry flowers.

A woodpecker
Drums and echoes
Across the still meadow

One man draws, and releases      an arrow
Humming, flat,
Misses a gray stump, and splitting
A smooth red twisty manzanita bough.

Manzanita     the tips in fruit,
Clusters of hard green berries
The longer you look
The bigger they seem,

	`little apples'


                   Gary Snyder
                   Turtle Island