Pastoral

by ALEXIS LATHEM

The ewes begin to stir when they see us coming.
From far across the field, leopard-spotted
with half-melted snow and tufts
of tea-colored grass, we hear the slush
of a dying winter

and as we near, we see the pink
spring petals of their tongues.
I’ve brought my young friend,
three years old, to see the lambs.

No, she doesn’t want to touch.
She must feel, I think, the meanness
of straw beds beaded with feces,
of bottles of soy milk that give stones,

though she hasn’t asked about the dead one.
And perhaps she feels, as she stands there,
her face to the blustery air, what
the long cold nights must be like—

the unfathomable snowfall as
lambs burrow into the fat sour warmth
of a mother ewe, who keeps one eye open,
waiting for the dawn.