a mother bear and three cubs

over the edge

our cabin is comfortably walled

and creature comforts surround us within it,

it could be anywhere

that has umbilicals for electricity, water, waste,

yet where it is here, the wild is just outside:

a national park, a creek, the woods,

unfenced nature we can enjoy

just over our own fence of screen wire,

usually the world outside is of Eden,

with only insects to be annoying,

this summer, though, bears have come over the fence,

the one native animal still around 

whose strength and attitude can challenge us,

the edge a perch for us,

but also an opening for the bear

to hope to come into our world

for the food we have in abundance,

leaf and seed and bug not enough 

to fill the holes of their hunger,

last evening, a mother bear and three cubs 

wanted to come into the Cabin

where they could smell food,

the apple so tempting,

her impetuous nose in the lead,

her claws snd muscles scratched to find a way

to the food she knew to be just inside,,

her sense of smell so acute that one M&M can entice her,

this night bananas, candy, a chicken stir-fry,

all the food inside, drew her 

for she and her cubs need to eat,

Winter is coming,

and they need to be fat,

the storm door in the way 

of the imperative of the mother  she is,

our anxieties are often abstract, at a remove,

the bear reminds us that we are only sort of in control,

that concrete reality can come over the edge,

and we can be expelled from Eden.

by Henry H. Walker

August 8, ‘18