A day late I clearly understood how 
you were circling back to your familiar desert,
tail tucked, believing now the lies you told beneath
a burning noonday sun. I remembered last your smile,
and you, resourceful, scrappy even, with wild coyote eyes
that had dulled when next I saw you 
on an Indian Summer afternoon.

I told you how your presence
on my lonely white buffalo woman horizon blazed
white lightning path to my truth-teller heart, forging
perfect pyramid where past, present, future converged
into single shining crystal star of knowing and sent life
and love pulsing uncontained, pouring unrestrained 
from a heart long-dead.

Having learned to honor winter's need
for soft reflection after speaking whole offering
of hope, I chose to stay and sit awhile. After knowing deeply
despite blinding snows, I saw frozen expression crack even
as your icy voice snipped away at my choice to honor
inner truth, to embrace the long way of
forgiveness first, freedom at last.

And I was alone again with a howling wind
that reminds me of your sly-footed way in this world.
In visions I saw you stealing fire, donning dress to suit
your need or fancy, then randomly remembering true gift,
your capacity to bring joy and laughter forth and birith
within yourself a world you often forget to imagine.

And so here in the North, where things are true
if also simple, I stand removed, apart, but sure the time
will be redeemed, the long winter's wait rewarded, my heart
fulfilled. I appear encumbered, restless, worn. But appearances
deceive, and sometimes when the veil is torn what we thought
we merely dreamed or imagined becomes the way forward,
sacred beauty unfolding as a desert flower.

Some say coyotes always change and never change
the way you hope they will, I know. Some say, too, white
buffalo woman wanders in fields few can stand to traverse.But
I remember a time when a coyote chose to become something more,
to believe something pure instead of shaking it off like a dream,
making it so sinister. And I know a white buffalo woman
who learned to laugh at summer sun, heart melting
as she sat enraptured by coyote's tale.


safe journey
through all the moons to come
this year of your coyote life.