My mother’s friend found me.
He was an angry farmer who spanked
my bottom.
Thwack!
Smack!
The crackling shuffle of rustling hoofs
sounded like a dance, as my cow friends
saw their chance to escape, leaving me alone
with the shouting stranger
who tossed me across
a mule’s broad back,
where I bumped and swayed
all the way
to a palm-thatched hut . . .
but Mamá was not there
in the little house.
She had gone
away.