TURNING CORNERS, LOOKING BACK

 

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We were driving a dishwasher 
to the summerhouse when the doe leapt 
in front of the car. 
Collapsed on the shoulder, she became 
a grassy statue tucked over a broken leg. 
Under the swollen moon’s judgment, 
we directed the passing 
cars and called the municipality.

Years later, her dark eyes are my children’s 
black marbles. I still hold my breath 
with every knife twist 
we drive on dark roads. 
My husband is sure we did enough. 
But how can he know, what we know? 
Stolen darkness. Stall or leap?
What it is to be left
in the hands of a hunter. 

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BIO: 

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Lindsay Kellar-Madsen writes compulsively in rare sleeves of time. She lives in the Danish countryside with her husband and four children, who wear shoes only when necessary. Her poems appear in The Shore, Humana Obscura, Porkbelly Press, Snapdragon Journal, and (forthcoming) The Wild Umbrella. Her latest children’s book is Meet the Wild (Little Otter Press, 2023).

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