History

Robert Morgan

Where cloudbursts tore a gash

in the shoulder of the ridge,

uprooting ferns and hedge,

a maple and an ash,

a honeysuckle vine

and wires of gold ground pine,

the slide exposed a vein

of mica, groundhog den,

a zone of luminous clay,

revealing rocks like teeth,

a seam of yellow earth,

and brought to light of noon,

after half a millennium,

there in the mud, a shining

coin of the Spanish king.