You Have the Tools, Use Them by Carol Moldaw

Meanwhile, while we were off
practicing mindfulness, a deer
staggered half-way up our drive
and collapsed on the front lawn,
most likely struck by a car.
Robin left it on voicemail,
asking if she could remove the deer
for us, in exchange for the meat
which she would butcher up then
and there. The meat, she said,
was pristine, so far untouched
by flies. She was impatient
to reach me, to get going
before a mountain lion found it.
At first I heard only “deer”
and called back thinking
she just wanted to let me know
she was there with the dogs
and had seen some deer
rubbing against aspen bark,
chewing the orchard grass.
That was almost that, until
she went through it all again,
this time making sure I heard.

Carol Moldaw is the author, most recently, of Beauty Refracted  (Four Way Books, 2018). Her poems have appeared in AGNI, Denver Quarterly, FIELD, The New Republic, The New Yorker, The Paris Review and The Threepenny Review, among other journals. She lives in Santa Fe, New Mexico.