One patch of ground begins to green
in the field where the taller weeds
line the far side—pale against the trees
as the black moon’s thread-thin edge,
proof enough of a light to come. Mars
is out, nearer the stars in its torch glow
and here on Beech Mountain
my stepfather has parked in the middle
of the road and gone out
in the cool spring night with a blanket
to place over a doe’s body—her two
hind legs crushed on the gravel.
