In summer when the moon was gone
we could walk the gravel road
down to the cottage in starlight
pupils cranked wide, sure footed     
its dips and curves mapped
in our atlas of collective memory
Listening more than we spoke
to show late feeding rabbits
we meant no harm
Small pops of crunching shale
telltales of our soft passage
to great horned owls and foxes
All of us on high alert
for ambling skunks
hunting grubs in upturned moss
Not knowing then
those moonless descents
would be the safest dark
we would ever know

Audio: Read by the author.