Deer Crossing

This morning, the car in front of me
stops suddenly, waits
as five deer emerge from somebody’s back yard,
crossing the frosty grass
to bound across the Boulevard
into the saplings of the Great Swamp.

I don’t know what to do
about the pregnant doe
I counted dead by the side of the road
three mornings last week,
her white belly shining
in the sunrise;
about the young buck hit yesterday,
spun down midst broken glass,
weeping,
and police cars.

I only know the boundaries are blurring:
that buck whose antlers flowered on his head
like found money,
slept in your bed last night,
that doe in mine,
while we stumbled in our nakedness,
running on all fours
through thickets of dark trees
to freeze in the stunning light
of an unexpected clearing.

Artist’s Statement

Last night as I thought about what poem might be my “milestone,” I sat looking through my binders from decades ago, recognizing poem after poem that I’d written in my mid-to-late twenties. Often when I turned a page, I entered a time machine of sorts as I found myself replaying the circumstances and emotions that gave rise to that poem. I saw that I was exploring some of the same themes then as now, and expressing personal concerns using natural imagery. Over the years, I wrote poems about childhood memories; poems about my experiences of birthing and caring for my own young children; poems about their childhood; poems on the way to divorce; love poems; and throughout, poems based on dreams and fantasies.

Having mined so much of my personal past, I began to feel, “It is time to write poems that go beyond the personal, poems that speak for the Earth and its inhabitants in a time of great vulnerability for all species, and for the planet, itself. We need poems that speak of universal concerns and point out that all beings exist as integral and inter-connected parts of the larger community of the universe” (from the Preface to Lizard Light: Poems from the Earth, the sequel to Turtle Blessing). “Deer Crossing” is a pivotal poem for me because it is among the first I wrote that pushed me into transformation. I drove that Great Swamp route morning after morning on my way to work, seeing deer after deer by the side of the road. I couldn’t just speak about those deer—I had to trade places with them! The power of that transformation led me to organize Turtle Blessing around affirming our connection with the animals and the planet. A number of the poems in my forthcoming book, The Night Marsh, incorporate my layperson’s understanding of quantum physics. More and more, rather than using natural images metaphorically, I find myself wanting to dissolve the separation between self and the larger reality of the planet.