Mothers among African black eagles hoard rock hyrax carcasses—jackrabbit-sized mammals hiding in kopjes—yet feed just one of two eaglets. Moms stand by looking bored as A-chick jabs its sib to bits. Great egret babes fight to the death in murmuring darkness; motherbird yawns.
Wearing her brother’s arm made her feel good. Made her feel closer to family. It was with the hand at the end of this arm that she grazed the Maine coon, swatted the kids’ heads, thrummed the dog’s ribs. Sometimes at the end of the day, the arm had a hard time winding down.
Diane Raptosh is the Eyck-Berringer Endowed Chair of English at Albertson College of Idaho in Caldwell, Idaho. She has published two books of poems, _Just West of Now_ (Guernica Editions, 1992) and ¬¬_Labor Songs_ (Guernica, 1999). Her new collection of prose poems, _Parents from a Different Alphabet_, is due to be published by Guernica Editions this fall.