Ask Yourself All the Good Questions
by Michelle Katz
Coyotes:
One wounded.
One dead.
Does the extent of the wounding surprise you?
Were you not aware that something needed to die?
Stay still.
If you must go,
Go slow.
Go further than your daily distance
Not too much further,
Just enough to stop
In a different place.
And when you can,
Stare right into the sun
So it burns off
What you don’t need
In order for you to truly see.
Only certain eyes
Can reveal an encounter with utter love.
If you cannot lay your head on your lover’s chest
Find rest on my open and ready ground
Letting the sands and soils into the roots of your hair
Remembering that all things take their time
Especially grief
Which is only known
Because you let love grow so whole-ly.
Come to the floor of the earth
For as long as you need.
Feel the gravity
Of what is dying.
Feel the chill
Reach your bones,
Begging the heart
To know the time for harvesting.
Ask yourself all the good questions.
And know the answers will meet you in the spaces between
Between the tree branches of the juniper
Between the distance of two birds
Between the meeting of sand and stone
In the expanse where the land holds the sky.
Cradled,
Face the stars of the night sky.
While Venus does its dance with Mars,
listen to the pack howling
In the not-too-far distance.