I found this jawbone relic of a deer.
The brook beside it gargled in the strait,
a narrow rapids, something of a ford.
White foam and algae lathered where the hinge
once bit for apples, licked for salt.
An arrow in its side, perhaps a bullet,
this is where it fell. The hunter
never followed in its tracks. And here
it settled into hard, cold sleep
having lost the will to stumble farther on.
One night I dug its body to restore it:
set the hazel jelly of its gaze,
refilled the silken pouches of its lungs
and stretched new hide. It wakened into air!
I watched it loping to its thicket lair.