Wednesday, January 30, 2013

raw

i learned a thing today
it was shocking
and so simple
whitetail deer eat lots of wood in winter.
bark, buds, twigs.
 this is a stomach 
full of fiber
 pulled away
  moved 
out of the belly cavity
and the organs eaten
by coyotes
 the light was so flat
it's hard to see
this dramatic
 young creature
who is now keeping another creature
alive
everybody eats somebody
close to here.
likely that yearling
drank from this pond.
at the new place
the place i will call home.

30 comments:

  1. Intense... but, that's what is. Beautiful pond. Who is that on the ice, a bird?

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  2. ...oh, and, I had chicken for lunch. So. I am a coyote of sorts, too.

    HA! I quite like my robot word... its "QueenWa"...!

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  3. next time you pass by lay a twig for me, a leaf if one is there...in memory. all things need to be remembered as well. it makes it worth just a little more to know some remembers.

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  4. valerie, yes, it IS intense, which is why i need to remember it. i reinstalled the robot after getting one too many spams
    henrietta, likely it will all be gone next time i'm over there. i wish the eaters would leave me a few leg bones, but couldn't take them in case someone needed to eat. they will become bone folders, of course.

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  5. oh, my. such wildness.

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  6. wild and so very real. thanks for mentioning that.

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  7. Wow! Lots of intensity but a wonderful honest looking at real life and death cycles. I figured it already is home for you now, at least in some parts of your heart.

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  8. Very wow.
    It's good to be reminded of cycles.
    There is a certain comfort in movement.

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  9. I'm not particularly squeamish so I look at this without reservation. Fascinating, this natural cycle of things. A science study of life how it is, how it goes on...one "end" feeding another that is not ending.

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  10. that is nature.no romantic notions.

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  11. Such is life but a surprise never the less especially in such a tranquil setting.

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  12. gruesome pix. also gruesome was learning that lambs in this district can pick up spear grass seeds [in their wool] that could eventually travel through thair flesh to their hearts and lungs. ick.

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  13. Hi V- I was deeply moved by the above pix today. Reminds me of when I was a child, growing up in real country. I spent a good many of my waking hours wandering in the woods and swamps surrounding my home. That is where I found my peace and nurturing. Thanks for the reminder of why nature is so real and how we tend to want to spiffy it up.
    Claudia

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  14. india, yes, they are. horrid how everybody makes a living.
    claudia, you had a childhood so different from mine, and yet i used to bike to the woods and the river all the time.

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  15. judy, indeed
    aimee, yes.
    lynn, yes, we need to remember
    christi, that stomach! yikes!
    neki, yes
    robyn, the setting is tranquil in appearance, but very very great north woods.

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  16. Beauty is everywhere. Especially where life and death merge, although sometimes it is not so apparent.

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  17. kristin, i found this very moving. i love the fact that the wild animal population here is so vibrant that everybody eats, and this winter they eat particularly well.

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  18. Feels like home when Jack shares similar images.
    It's reality and as you say,
    everybody eats somebody.
    I have felt this way myself at times, splayed out.

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  19. nancy, living here is a very real experience, as you know well.

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  20. You've got to salute animal life for its efforts to survive. The carnage is so awful to see, but as you philosophically suggest, old life becomes new.
    You're moving soon Velma?

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  21. faisal,
    just, as we say here, down the road a piece.

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  22. something to keep an eye on as it disappears/decomposes. i wonder what will remain in that spot, if anything.

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  23. joni, i don't get over there enough, but heard yesterday there were four ravens eating.

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  24. a long time ago my crazy horse ran over a cliff and fell into a gully when the local cowboy was rounding up his herd on the property where he had been put out to pasture, the next day a pair of wedge tail eagles flew past my verandah so close I could almost touch them in thanks for a good dinner...

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  25. i love this post. i've always been fascinated looking at dead animals - if only because that's the only time we get to study them so closely, and learn some of their secrets. thanks for posting.

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  26. drucilla, only hunters, tend to see this, and really, this one was interesting because it had been killed, and partially eaten by coyotes. i haven't been back, yet, but hope to go over today.

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  27. I am still amazed at what you learnt - all that wood, twig, fibre in the deer's stomach. Totally intriguing.

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  28. fiona, i knew they were browsers, but i had NO idea that outsized stomach would be full of fiber!, and totally uninteresting to scavengers.

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