Wolf

In the 3 a.m. dark, 
I nuzzle you well, own my dream
And the leafless stem of time.

In the soft breathing
your pads become my tread.
your smooth, worn claws 
glisten in the starlight.

From Saginaw to McKinley 
your night echo wails 
off the canyon wall. 

I watch, through your dark cornea,
the elk pick in the mist-choked swamp.

                                    And late at moon, wolf,

when the silence of my kind 
erases the present, I taste 
from your tongue 
and feel the incisor cut
living from the dead.