Inner Animal

year of the mother wolf

---
May 1, year of the mother wolf

I was the wolf last night. I slipped easily into her body and strode, so close to the earth, and felt the smell of it. I was fluid, I was powerful sinews as poetry, I was hot-blooded, I was the howl of the night. And when her form slipped from me I loved my hands the most.

---
May 22, year of the mother wolf

I went to the tower last night for the last time.
I went to the tower last night for the first time.

Across a wooded lawn and straight to the building. I knew where I was going even though it had been decades since I had gone. Or even though I had never been.

Gone up slick steps into the ancient brick and plaster place, straight down a marbled hallway, darkened after sunset on a dim autumn day. Through a turnstile to a desk built into the place in deep carved wood. Seemed like a barrier.

A couple of women were tending it and some young men were nearby doing things. I told the woman at the desk I wanted to go to the tower, and said some watchword that I don't remember now, but I expected her to understand. She didn't. Almost tried to ignore me. So I inquired again. She turned and asked another woman nearby, was there any tower? I butted in and said the watchword again, the other said "I don't know."

An older lady came over and said "Show her in there." And pointed to half open door. I realized that the two other ladies were too young to remember, were not born the last time I came to the tower.

Through the door was an unused back hall, and twisty stairs up and down. I ascended steps that each curved down in the middle, lightly ran my hand along a polished wood rail, ascending into space lit by tiny faceted windows, frosted with dust.

On the final landing was a small space, a gallery to a larger room. You could have peered over the rail and down several floors to some large space, but I didn't. I noticed tables and chairs obviously unused by the way they were situated against each other. But that's not what I was moving toward. There was a woman lying on the floor, crooked, her knees drawn up, her arms behind her, her head bowed. And over her head was tied a sweater or shirt of some bronze fabric.

As I approached her she moved and that upset me.

She spoke. "Don't worry about this. I am just fine here. Comfy." I knew her. She had been here last time I came to the tower, three and a half decades earlier. She was older than me.

Seeing her there on the floor made me feel the deep distance between myself and the younger me, her other visits, her familiarity with this place, her certainty that she belonged, that she would return.

A time had come when I did not return. And maybe ... I forgot.

The woman on the floor was speaking to me:

"It's alright for you to come back here now, you know. And you can return again any time. But I won't be here much longer."

I knew what she meant. I knew what I would do. And my head felt very full. Almost too full to stand.

---
July 20, year of the mother wolf

When I was going over to the fountain I stopped and looked and there on the ground was a stone. It was rounded and long and when I picked it up it fit my hand somehow, one end being wider than the other; it lay flat and sweet in my hand. I put it in my pocket and felt the fabric of my dress pull. Felt the stone in the pocket against my thigh as I walked. Walked a little more slowly and thoughtfully, and, at the pool, looked in and really saw the water, or maybe saw past the water and more deeply into what I needed.

---
July 27, year of the mother wolf

Forgot the sand forgot the beehive. Cant sip the honey cant bear the breezes carving my hair into waves. Someone filches the milk of my mind, my hand is empty, palm up. Take hold like a seedling in the sand and slip past another growing season, roots bare as my leaves wither.

---
September 3, year of the mother wolf

Fishing. Having cast out and sitting,
I was not made to wait upon their folly.
Hunter in my blood, I simmer beside the river,
I glow in the dark,
I exude the perfume of a monster,
I thrash like a cranky crocodile.

---
September 14, year of the mother wolf

The Dance and A Puzzle: A doll's head
Leaning on a dusty corner
Her puckering face a curiosity.
Nasty wide open eyes have
A feigned innocence of one
Already raped and resigned
To more.

The Dance: silent feet through
The still air sparkling with dust motes,
A slit of sun slices the big empty room that
That captures time across generations estranged.
A pale dancer passess through them all with ease.

A Puzzle: its pieces strewn
The relief of their edges formal, logical.
I sit and stir the puzzle bits: Their little tabs are like smug arms.
The mess is complete without being assembled.
Don't have to see the picture.

---
November 30, year of the mother wolf/p>

At last it broke.
And after the silence of a breath held -- Light.

Dawn,
A blinding slash above the hills,
Shut down the night
And all who lurked withdrew into shadow.

Poised above the leavings of Night
Her warm juice pumped.
Mother wolf yawned
A big satisfied, teeth-bearing grin.

And that was it.
She turned and stepped away
From the carcass of the half-eaten looser,
So triumphant she could afford
To leave the rest to worms.

---
December 9, year of the mother wolf

I was the wolf again last night and I tasted raw blood in my mouth. I moved very fast and steady through the scenes, tasted, smelled, saw, but never finished anything.