Chacal

      by Mimi Ferraro


Le conozco, yo no tengo miedo, Chacal   
I know you; I am not afraid.  This morning, a few hours before dawn, I wake up early, 
decide to go for a walk; follow the path at the south end of the driveway.  Around me, a 
felt landscape: mysterious, cratered, lunar.  Moon frosts field edges.  The canyon flutes 
scraps of sound: quail’s querulous chatter, an owl’s chaste vowel; crickets whirr and 
tremble. It happens once again, this peculiarity of moment as night fades: a path known, 
now unfamiliar; but, I don’t turn on the flashlight, trust instincts, stubbornly feel my way 
along pebbly surface, slippery rocks, down to the main road.  I follow the canyon road 
west for 20 minutes or so, then turn back, a blood shiver of light to the east; sky lightens.  
That’s when I hear stirring, a rattle of stone behind me.   I turn around.  Nearby, a 
coyote, perched on rock bed, quietly observes me.  We shock stare.  I back up slowly, 
turn, small stones scramble and roll.  I keep walking.  The coyote, stays at a measured 
distance, shadows, mimics my pace, follows about 75 ft behind.   When I stop, he stops: 
sculptural, still; moon unblinking above.  Then together we continue our ghostly communion, 
trace a path down a road that streams, tangles; time arterial as blood, species.   Feral, 
inside our animal skin, we never stop moving.  Match muscle, sinew, pulse, claw.  Bewitched, 
crazed by the silver spell of moon.  Kajote, we’ve met before.  Shamanic singer,
who can forget: velvet shadow on flat mesa, above craggy rock ledge under full moon, 
head thrown back.   Yelp   howling    Sheer   blue   blue   notes  escape  like wild 
birds.  One note held severs the world.   Dawn breathes fire.    
Chacal I know you and I am not afraid.