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P.T., 1936

IN OCTOBER, an honest young printing executive
from Maine passed through this desert
en route to San Diego.
A year or two shy of the Westons and in
the betweens, I like to think he'd
pause to regard a view there'd never be again,
here linger glance for once at makeready waste,
heat-inversion flats that may just prefigure true sea.

Any reliable firm there can have his complete
business history with photo. All
the (scant) evidence makes him a poet,
believer in physiognomy, appearances and
the restorative promise of antipodean change -
rain to none, pine to creosote,
ruin to resolve - a geographer whose
turns and shifts inscribe the terrain in
slips of tongue, conjectural wash and
stuttered ink these years anon.
badland, spring; glass, mirage.
At right scale, errors none.

11 nov 98