In the reaches of the night

Something calls in the reaches of the night, where stars

wash back and forth, caught in the swell of the sky.

 

Its wordless words are saying that this place between

hoof, paw and the netted stars, that stirs in flaring nostrils

 

and tastes of the night, is love and anguish at its loss, is

birth and death and all of life between, muscles sliding

 

beneath hide and feathered flight. It says, listen to life

calling, hear its song in the snailshell of the ear, feel it

 

growing deep in the bones. Keep it close, let it not be

snatched away snuffed out in blood and tears,

 

but carry it always to sing, loud-throated as the blackbird,

into the teeth of death and the last silence.