Game

By Lois Red Elk

Tracks are all that define these voices,

hungry lives pulsing sacred ground.

We are a journey of distressed shapes,

red essence on parchment, occupying a life.

We look for the fated four-legged that paced

this way, a tested and well-worn path

among storms, mud, into this shared hidden

brush. Coyote, slipping by through old

winter grass, warns in a pagan tongue,

licking after our scent. We pick up pace,

tighten our careless reins, snap back at the

yellow-eyed clown with throat hunger,

that gnawing bone that drives us on. Quieted,

we hear the heart beating. A desperate breath

crashes through dry branches, a silhouette

give away. In an instant we let go

of weapons and invite a quick death. We

watch our knives glistening. Obsidian

works for us. What image of blood on flesh,

odor of iron. A vermilion sun heavy with

spring looks upon reflections of death

in hard visions, our favorable hunt—

whitetail not quick enough for downwind

lessons. Our horses burdened, deer shadows

left on landscape, we push forward.

These tracks ours now. Game will heal all.

Our offspring dance, Grandmother prepares a

fire and sharpens another knife. During the

feast we thank any god absent from our table.

Copyright Credit: Lois Red Elk, "Game" from Dragonfly Weather. Copyright © 2013 by Lois Red Elk. Reprinted by permission of Lost Horse Press.