The opening scene of a late night movie pans the Northern California coast.  Muir Woods, the Golden Gate bridge.

These visuals resound through my cells, humming and rising flesh in a surprising and tingling resonance.  Just to see this place on the 13 inch monitor of my laptop screen satiates some unknown need.

Perhaps my body somehow knows the source of its existence.  That my parent’s love was seeded in the inlets of Sausalito.  Maybe it’s the escape – from the summery heat of the San Joaquin Valley to my aunt and uncle’s on the other side of Mt. Tamalpais – that still evokes reprieve.

Where the tides lap against the land from Mt. Tam to Santa Lucia, therein rests a piece of my heart.

Somewhere in last night’s movie was a quote from a Robert Hass poem I had never heard before.

This morning I wake with snippets.

“…dusks smelling of Madrone…lupine grows thick in the rockface…self-heal at creekside…”

I’m left with mysteries.

How a landscape can root its essence deep inside my body.  How a string of words can sing, even if I don’t know why.

“…What I want happens
not when the deer freezes in the shade
and looks at you and you hold very still
and meet her gaze but in the moment after
when she flicks her ears & starts to feed again.”

– from “Santa Lucia” by Robert Hass