woodsman, i have a song for you

cull on o woodsman cull & mountain roll
fish the silver streams & bait the bears or dance
with bears. you sleep alone or next to a pit
bull. you build a fire early early morn you don’t
mess with colemans you don’t mess with bread.
you eat the inner lichen from an ancient tree
you lick the bark for moisture.
you piss in the dawn’s darkness & it is a luxuriant
sound. the woods leaving you to return to woods.
you know you will return to me. you will
bring me a heart. it will be a bambi heart or a
woodchuck heart or a porcupine or even a baby
bear’s after you’ve danced the mother
into cotillion, into waltz, into oblivion. she knows
what you’re capable of but you have the charm
of a shy Southern boy and his killing instincts
too. you kill for me daily &
i never thank you. i take the jewel i take
the box. i watch the heart harden
on red velvet. always red. & i watch the mother
bear sway and shiver and sway and long 

Ryder Collins has a novel, Homegirl!, available from Honest Publishing Press. Her work has also been published in Wigleaf, > kill author, DIAGRAM, The Southeast Review, and Fix It Broken, among others. She also has a chapbook of poetry, Orpheus on toast.