PERSONHOOD
Jawbone of a deer along the trail,
jagged incisors winged
with little points, sheath of bone
damask with clay and blood.
I heard coyotes arguing with dogs last night
and thought about the senselessness
that can’t be helped, the cunning
and cupidity of hunger, the indiscriminate
meals we stop to take. This unnamed
sandy stream babbles as it doglegs
around itself. A muskrat carries
an apricot into the earth. The resident
blue heron lights off when it hears
my footfalls on the path.
Its complaint is an asthmatic,
dissonant sound. It throws its shadow
on the dead ash trees
whose dehisced branches rise
like antlers, like trophies
rooted from their little skulls
Cal Freeman is the author of Fight Songs and Poolside at the Dearborn Inn. His chapbook, Yelping the Tegmine, has just been released.
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