for Taylor Hada

The moon shivers in feral sky.
Cries of coyotes echo
in the void, pierce the silence

between a canyon and forever.
Shrill voices slice the dark
and the light in chilling fragments,

remind me of the pain
I thought I had forgotten,
the betrayal of a prairie moon.

If I told you my grandpa
as a young man
had a coyote for a pet

you might not believe me
but I have an old, sepia photo
of a young man crouching

beside a wild dog, each
wary of the other, both
seem surprised to be so close.

I have also been told
Grandpa used to run down
Jack Rabbits on foot.

This wild night,
This wild night
yammering beneath timeless stars

I shudder to contemplate
that which precedes me.
The coyote in all of us.