Spring Salad

First shoots—

backyard weeds & flowers

of April. Headless dandelions with sweet quill greens,

chives spiking through a broken pot.

Garlic tops tassel from the wintered patch,

light like feathers, with a light taste.

Chervil, hidden in the rock garden,

under the dauntless sorrel

sorrel, so sour,

softened by chervil’s licorice lace.

Violets everywhere, reigning purple,

divine jewels in the salad crown—

I put a white one in the center,

taste the earth’s promise.

Warrior Buffalo

I know a buffalo, this buffalo

I smell, his body standing close,

a cowbird perched atop his towered back

just so, grubbing bugs. He’s heaving,

his scat’s not right, there’s blood.

A second shot from my Henry rifle

rends his chest, a bone dangles

from this 2,000 pounds of thunder,

weaving through prairie gulches

for water to stave the thirst, for mud

to staunch the bullet hole.

Two days galloping, a storm gallop,

but my pinto has closed on him.

He smells the pony, hears the spur jangle.

My guts drag. I can’t stop

the bleeding.

With my good hoof I X this spot.

Myself I measure

by heart.

I must remain

still, unheeding.

When the cowboy

comes for me

I will gore him

in the throat.

The horn will leave

his neck and pierce his ear.