Fox

I walked out of the dark

into the light I fell:

through branches of blue painted trees,

the air like ice against my skin, the moon’s face

a mirror into which I climbed,

descending past the sky and the angels

praising the handmaid of the Lord,

past the oligarchs of heaven who watched

my feet pad heavily against the fir blanket beneath.

She panted beside me, her teeth reflecting

the moon’s light, her fur knit with twigs and leaves.

Up to the heavens I stared at the gods standing beneath me

as they guarded their fire, their arms folded tight.

I stared as she, in her russet, sidled next to me,

Rubbing my leg and pleading

For silence and a place to rest her head.

To A Boy Entombed

A horse on the wall of their hotel room

carried her away to a place she’d always go,

and yet, had never been: to a boy,

entombed in falling snow, out in the moon-

light, throwing his voice against her

window, which glowed yellow in the night.

He sang out his life, lying

frozen against the earth: for her.

Thirty years later tears dropped

down her cheeks to the bedsheets

while her husband rested his hand on her

neck, her shoulder, her arm:

a stone feather.  And snow tapped

silently against the window.