Robert Ostrom

THE KINGDOM

she was my skin my sky and earth
lived in the hollow of a fallen tree
I curled up on her belly beside my ghost
brother we nursed for months waited
for life to stir outside waited for the heather
cock the dormouse gray wolves and raven
cry at last spring came she taught me how
to climb a birch slept on my back in her soft
fur she on her back in the ferns drifting
off to the noise of a moose grazing alder
leaves we got into trouble my brother and me
tussled in the brush climbed into the window
of a deserted cabin matched paw to hand
prints in the dirt and watched mine fill with
rain back to home led by the scent of the sea
dinner was cowberries and a fistful of ants
laughing and licking them off my arm
mother cradled me in her forelegs licked
my head though I was slow to find my feet
the day came when she chased me away
as much as I clamored she was resolute done
with me over time I ran to her less and less
and farther and farther to the edge of the forest
I strayed when the hunters found me my ghost
brother was up in a tree looking for wild honey
they took me to a city gave me a name a room
brought me to a man who pointed at me
then pushed his cold white finger to my brow
traced a cross oiled my chest poured water 
on my head my ears my mouth the glamour
of evil he said created in your likeness he said
and on the skin of all the people there colored
by light through stained glass windows I saw
a shadow pass it made me bellow bark those
people shrieked all the water in the kingdom
of god couldn’t wash the wild off me years
later I ran off just to taste the sap on a pine
when I turned around she was standing there
timeworn her fur tattered in places one paw
maimed her scent was home I knew then
I had never been and always will be alone

ROBERT OSTROM is the author of Sandhour, Ritual and Bit, and The Youngest Butcher in Illinois. He lives in Ridgewood, New York, and teaches at New York City College of Technology.