(Photo credit: Alaska Region U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service, used under CC BY-NC-ND 2.0)
I am wolf.
I am caribou.
I am the circle and the blossom
And the unfolding dance.
I am the rich red life-giving blood
And the tundra’s summer passion.
Spirit of the tundra,
Lighting midnight
With your flickering magic,
Give me a cave
In your high alpine meadows
And I will walk the skies for you
On floating clouds of wildflowers.
And I will tend your thick brown bogs
And shepherd all your children.
And when summer fades
I will merge my bones
With fur and feather and petal.
__
Mary de La Valette ’90
