Spring/ Country
A neighbor texts, ‘It’s getting warm. Beware.
I’ve seen more signs of bears.’
We keep watch.
A tree crashes. Something
heavy is tearing it apart.
Through the understory, we trace
teeth notching through bark,
study
the scattered scat,
scattered seeds,
the metal bent to the ground.
And what about the signs we leave?
We cling to the wild
yet smell human.
We seize what’s natural
yet our trash is oiled and heavy.
As vain as the bear is simple,
we yell, ‘Come Here! Stay Away!’
And what we don’t know we imagine:
A dark cave,
An unimaginable torpor,
Something like ourselves
A brute.
A clever monster.
