Every day he announces his presence, clockwork.
I see the fox, the tail so full
and I want to touch it.
The face so sweet, the white muzzle,
the way it moves from one side of the hill to another,
memorizing every stone,
the way it lies down on ground to watch me,
as if it is easy and not just fear, not hunger.
And when I see it
I have to love and hate it
because its body is my cat,
my neighbor’s cat,
and even though I hurt
I know that this was not a gunshot,
not an accident on the road,
not a long illness.
This is god swallowing what it must.