Class of 2024 and Other Ethereal Things

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CLASS OF 2024 AND OTHER ETHEREAL THINGS


After graduation night, hors d'oeuvre

plates heaped with well-intentioned 

lies about keeping in touch, 


the dog left a baby bunny 

on the front porch. I carried it 

in the shallow hollow of a shovel, 


tucked it in dirt beneath the oak tree 

next to the bluebird and the bat. 

When I came back he’d snatched 


another one from some unseen nest.

I held it a moment. It was shocked

and breathing fast. It’s a shivering thing,


the moment, and one too wild

to bring inside and raise it as our own. 

Maybe the best we can ask 


is that it live to see another day, 

and then a quiet front-porch view 

to watch it slip away 


beneath the blackberry hedge. 

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