a yellow orb shifts against the shock of dark vertical bark, her back                    split diagonal, flayed & a bright fleshysuspension in the copse of trees, her hooves scrape packed dirt, legs                    sway like she’s dancing on hindquarters & I couldtake her body inside me, like the medicine I need, or wrap her                    skinned hide, congealed blood flaking, a cloak against the comingnight & I’d wear her ears, pin her white-warning-tail to my backside                    as regalia for all the deer-dead, but the painting only approachesher in 2-d—a portal of slim brushstrokes, paint upon paint, so I step                    into the field, from the left, outside the frame, push through tallburnished grasses, bending slightly, my feet crush crickets, trample                    late blooming goldenrod & I let the heat of the day leak outof the air like a balloon popped & swirling, so I can become Field. Dress. Portal.                    What’s the worst possible thing to ask of yourself? Maybe believingin whatever makes demands on your own inner life, like how love                    is supposed to save even the most hardened ones. Only this dead doe’shead bows & whistles to the others, come find me—quick, like light,                    or like all the seedpods’ sudden dispersal, their unrealized progeny floataway without a care for the end result.