Girl in the Cave

For years, the messages go unanswered.

Receiving no response is a kind of response.

She hardly remembers their slips and starts.

She marks their breaks in time.

But she mostly thinks there is not enough time, watching

as it cascades like water over the edge,

pooling past the shale and sandstone.

Lies form and free themselves on her lips.

She tells stories. Spins stories about animals.

There’s this story about a black bear, she says,

and the hunter who chased it deep into the woods.

Careening through the southeastern woods,

tracing a muddied path. The ancient silence

yielding just the slow heaving of breath.

The rush of leaves and sticks that split

in their wake, breaking against the earth

as a train named Hercules rumbled

in the distance. The bear gallops on,

past Cedar Sink and leads the man

into a limestone cave and the man rushes

headlong into it, only coming to a stop

when he finds himself in a licking coldness.

Bellowing for help, his cries unanswered.

Terrorized by the silent, dripping earth.

Blinded by night and damp with a target

on his back, he’s sure. His open eyes

no different than shut eyes. She likes this part:

How the man got lost, how the bear outwit him

in the end. How the bear knew how to get away.