It's Not Right

This poem is for Raven. She was a two week old Pineywoods Calf. Someone shot her from the road. Her mamma Blackberry charged us when we tried to get near her baby, she was standing over Raven nuzzling her. Her moo's were hauntingly mournful. She would run to the herd for comfort then back to her dead baby. Her sister Louise was the most caring and consoling. They are the best of friends to this day.

The weeks following Raven's death, Blackberry slowly became calmer, her moo's less mournful. Two weeks following Raven's burial, I was in the pasture with the herd. I reached my hand out to Blackberry to let her sniff me, something I do often to say hello. As soon as she sniffed me she let out a loud and mournful moo. It was only then that I realized I was wearing the same gloves I wore when I carried Raven weeks earlier.

Your mamma's calls are tinged with longing, her panic sharp in the darkness.
 
The light lifts into grey. Mamma's cries carry a convoy of anguish, of ache.
 
It’s not right.
 
Mamma is distant from the strength of the herd. Homeless.
 
I walk closer, the light betrays mamma's storm. You are the eye.
 
It’s not right.
 
You neglect mamma's nuzzles, unmoved by her tenderness.
 
Mamma swings her horns at my intrusion, defending you from harm already afflicted.
 
It’s not right.
 
Mamma calls to the herd in the distance. The herd is silent. Your eyes are silent. 
 
Broken, my heart reaches quietly to mamma through a tunnel of soft words. Her wails heave higher.
 
It’s not right.
 
Mamma cleans you, comforting you, waiting for you to answer her, to rise. Mamma moves to the herd.
 
Mamma bends her head to a sister, who licks her ears, returning the comfort she has given you. A companion in her loss, in her anguish.
 
It’s not right.
 
Mamma is incomplete with the herd, baby. Mamma is incomplete with you.
 
It’s time baby. I lift you. Your fatal cold suffocates through me. I carry you away.
 
It’s not right.
 
I build. A home for you baby. Near the youngest pear. My dream: that your alliance will grow a fresh shoot, your essence endless in this family tree.
 
A sunken home, the shape of you. I arrange you with family:
 
Cedar and quartz to protect, pecans in place of mamma's milk, grass. A feather from guinea, a playmate for chase and chatter. 
 
I have only tangled whisper and voided word to bequeath, baby. Please accept the only gift I have to give, to wrap you in the arms of your new mamma. Earth