A coyote wandered down the road

over which I sat at a window above, 

reading. 

It entered the property

on which I live, and instead

of feeling any sort of alarm,

for this is quite an unusual sight

— the invisible making itself visible —

along this eastern stretch of north shore, 

I felt thrilled.

It is not every day

that one gets to see

those who once roamed 

wild and free upon lands

cut up, packaged into parcels, 

branded real estate and cultivated

to eliminate anything remotely deemed

wild. 

I felt its tension,

the heaviness of its

predatory bearing in so

unnatural—unnatured—

a setting.

I felt its loneliness,

no pack in sight.

I felt its confusion,

its displacement, so like

my own. 

I felt its

stolid being,

still,

the space it roamed,

not where I could see it 

— out there — but deep 

within.

And I remembered

that I, too, have a wilderness

within me. One that spreads across

continents and time zones and property lines

of peoples and powers and nations. 

And I remembered

to breathe into this vast place

unlimited by my narrow human scope,

unlimited by mankind’s endless

conquering and settling and

occupying and claiming.

And I saw that like

this coyote, I am free

even amidst all that isn’t.

That I am sovereign

in my flesh pelt 

and bone

castle. 

That I am

the sum of all parts,

part of all that is

ever expanding

the sum.

—Eve Moore

**

Eve Moore: Once a professional writer of advertising, I saw the light & it has shown me words of a different nature. And so I take them down & offer them up. And all is well.

This poem was submitted exclusively to CrystalWind.ca by Eve Moore.