Keening

By Kathleen McCoy

It comes back in a rush as you hold the one
who's at that border-bog between

greenness and fever-fire: your dream
where she stands tremulously then falls,

falls into you, heart to beating heart,
passes through your body, rises as a rush

of smoke toward the stained glass
high above your heads.

With nurse's hands now upon her wrist
comes the somber nod. A low horn howls

deep in distance yet grows nearer, red
and black and green, coyote call clawing

over many mountains in dim mist,
watery wail that worms its way

through, in a fit of frisson,
whatever beast you have become.