All Free

the dead fox trots along the road

shows my bicycle where to go straight

where to turn, the fox looks back

to find me at its heels, keeps

leading me on, more foxes join us

spring from woodland, up from marsh

foxes before & behind, sometimes

their noses touch, their bodies rub side

to side, the bicycle whirs, the foxes

step lightly, we reach the meadow

where I dismount, where they disport

like children, like the deer I saw at dawn

in Tennessee under pink sky in diamond-

sparkled grass, their prance & dance

all in a circle, all of us dead, all free

Alberto Caeiro [aka Fernando Pessoa]:

Poor flowers in the flower beds of manicured gardens.

They look like they’re afraid of the police . . .

But they’re so true that they bloom in the same way

And have the same ancient coloring

They had in their wild state for the first gaze of the first man,

Who was startled by the sight of them and touched them lightly

So that he would see them with his fingers too.