— in memory of Hannah Arendt
the raccoon curls as if sleeping, nose tucked
toward a belly fat from summer feed
the lustrous black-ridged tail of a gray fox
skunk’s pungence, hawk’s wing
twigged legs of an antlered deer
these bloodied remnants soil the road
as inescapable a part of ourselves
as the snail’s shell is to its occupant
out of the raccoon’s eyes looks
a Palestinian child, a questioning gaze
as child & raccoon endure their mutual fate
curl & are curled as if sleeping
the two as one being, the raccoon no less
no more than the Palestinian child
violence changes the world, but the most
probable change is a more violent world