Elephant Song

On evenings filled with rain the elephants believe my open door leads to a green stretch of forest and trundle through.

Each concocts a song or howl of her own— a moan of bassoon, a pitch of piccolos and even agonies of strings to tell of elephant

tragedies coated in silt. The mind is a traitor giving away our tales when we are half awake,

the elephants to fall in love with then and follow into the music, loud in the meadow, softer in the shade of trees.

Only their ears detect the mourning notes delivered by miles of unsuspecting stone. Through her skinny bird feet, Honeyguide,

bereft, never gleans more than sugar, and monkeys still pick and chatter and elephants move

to safety, colors same as vapor, same as wood, same as sky. They stand plain, enormous, hidden. Drift closer to hear nightsong, closer

to dream the prancing dog—wise as Buddha, closer to meet elephants in a dripping melodic forest.