Despite Everything

It was the summer an eagle flew over Steve's housejust as we stood outside to say goodbye, the summersleek, oily bear cubs rolled through mulch at Jon's.Four deer grazed in the field, and a turkey pairbookended their brood in a neighbor's driveway.The groundhog had groundhogs and they nibbledclover, tunneled into the garden. Coyotesbig as wolves attacked a dog. Outside the gate,a garter snake lunged at guests, but the feral catlet us draw close enough to see her broken teeth.Hummingbirds on the Rose of Sharon. The samefat toad on the walkway. We took nothing as a sign.Not the white sharks off the coast. Not the hornets’nest that clogged the screech owl house. The appletrees finally blossomed. Everything was hungryor sated, hunting or fat, pink mouthed, sugared —a small world balanced out the corner of our eye.