to belong as a shadow, an aster,
a fern, a moldering stick; to lumber
among still bodies but remain
a part of the whole, to be large
but not repugnant, horizontal
when others are vertical —
hickory, birch, blackgum, pine,
the passage of sunlight along the forest floor,
wind turning leaves like pages —
when the hulks of two deer pass through
what precedes, what follows,
is the message in disturbance.