SIRENightengale

mountain woman, mountain woman, won't you come down to the river? where bears sing falsetto groans and wolves stripe their fur in cranberry; you are bare-footed climbing the grandfather trees, wild-bird paint in your eyes, prickles under your toenails, and thunder drowns in water below. raccoon-children with their mischief-hands sleep in your hair and crawl down your slate-rock nose; skeleton-men along your gorge beneath your upper lip where sirens would ride their horses along your jawline, and grey is your wisdom with empty caverns. mountain-man paws his gravels, sits against the lightning where war-husbands eagle themselves. yo