Twilight’s wind
shook the song
of leaves and river sand

through Nidoba’s bones.

I felt the wolf’s spirit
run over my boots

as if water
were drifting in cool silver
toward the woodland shore

There,
I found her lying
half-curled in death

like a moon
in winter’s shadow.

For weeks,
I nourished her,

my proud hands tending
wounds with dressings soft

as breath
that rose from the mountain’s voice.

She healed
and led me through the raw land
of rock and timber,

of field and hill
drum beating thunder

and footsteps dancing
behind a long shirt of clouds.

I came home
to my tribe whispering

low and ancient in the way
wood smoke hems the forest floor

while she faded
in to the color of birch trees.

Somewhere now
she sleeps
under grass and stone,

Her skeleton tilling
the earth
for tomorrow’s sun.


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