Produced by Dennis Camire
This week’s poem is by Sonja Johanson of Bethel. Her most recent book is “Trees in Our Dooryard” published by Red Bird Chapbooks.
By Yourself
By Sonja Johanson
There used to be a zoo
on the island, for the tourists.
They had baby lynx, fallow deer,
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colobus monkeys. In the side
pasture were bison.
It was barely spring. Driving
toward the bridge, a female
was alone, back of the field.
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I knew nothing about bison,
barely anything of cattle, even.
But she moved wrong, moved
in a way that made me pull
my car over to the muddy
shoulder, stomach clenched.
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I watched her arch and heave.
It took only minutes. Her haunches
buckled as something large and dark
slid to the dead grass. She turned
to lick her calf alive. I sobbed and shook
all the long drive over the causeway.
Dennis Camire can be reached at [email protected].
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