THE RABBIT
—Mary Oliver
Scatterghost,
it can't float away.
And the rain, everybody's brother,
won't help. And the wind all these days
flying like ten crazy sisters everywhere
can't seem to do a thing. No one but me,
and my hands like fire,
to lift him to a last burrow. I wait
days, while the body opens and begins
to boil. I remember
the leaping in the moonlight, and can't touch it,
wanting it miraculously to heal
and spring up
joyful. But finally
I do. And the day after I've shoveled
the earth over, in a field nearby
I find a small bird's nest lined pale
and silvery and the chicks—
are you listening, death?—warm in the rabbit's fur.
___________________
—Medusa
