Consolation

My mother found it watering the plants—
a hind leg bone. We considered, once we dug
a shallow hole between two shrubs, waiting
for my father to cover it.

For weeks, he’d searched the fields for signs:
a turkey hawk, coyote, heavy machines
expanding the road against our fence line
and it seemed he lived outside. After dark

each night, he returned from the fields alone
to sit on the porch awhile, his back to us,
the lonely cat like darkness in his arms,
rocking back and forth a quiet consolation.