The Bear

by Andrew Krivak

poems about gods and men and the wars between them, the beauty of small things, and peace. He read stories true and not true. Stories about a house in the woods, a hunter and a mermaid, and rabbits in search of a home. And when he was finished and had blown out the candle, she would always ask, as though making certain she was back in her own world, These others, they’re gone, too? Yes, he would say. For a long time now. And we’re alone? Not alone. We have each other. Now go to sleep and I’ll see you in the morning.

But I miss whom I once could touch, as all must do when we make our way through whatever forest or wood it is in which we travel or are raised.

telling them of her gratitude for what they would give her, but knowing she could not have survived the winter without what she had been given, regardless of what she had made.

And when the fire was only embers, she placed two of them in her tin cup stuffed with green leaves and covered the charcoal and ash in the pit with dirt and pushed pine needles all around so that it looked as though no one or no thing had ever done more than pass through that grove.