Pond Song

A necklace of evening smoke
plys its trade on her collarbones,
mudhens swirl in the ebb jaws

of pond water. “i thought they were
coots,” she says, lolling her hair
and a coyote brushes its thicket.

Cattails nod along to lullabies wondered
by septuagenarians asking her name–
days weeks months of

weeks and days dancing
in sparks between her brows. “Tell me
another story,” she says.