2
And you might wonder,
having hauled down
so much of something new,
gutted and cut up and stinking in the fire,
by what four-legged power does a god move?-
You, who on hands and knees
have imagined the animal,
hooted and tied blind in the dark,
ridden the buffalo back from death,
eaten dogs as dogs eat,
and now this tall one,
this
tall dog....
3
And the next one?
Would you get down on all fours
and paw
at your shadow?
Would you run
~ith
dogs?
Would you have two legs and land
like an island around you?
Imagine you have taken this flesh into your own,
have arranged the bones,
have waited.
And thought there could
be
no two of this one.
That you should starve and sleep with dogs
and the next day rise as you were
and rise the day after that
to look again for water,
to find in each step the weight of the next
and the next until you are followed
or standing still,
this footpath of your fathers.
