When the cow dies, Ora reaches for her children,

their mouths wide as magnolia blooms, holes

for which there were never enough rabbits to club and skin.

The hush becomes the weather rushing through that holler,

becomes what the weather rushing through that holler tells her:

Timber fires in their stumps smolder on the hillside

like the burning oil of many lamps.

Clotted rock splits dry the burley leaves they cannot eat.

Even a foaming wild dog cannot drink the water it finds.