—a calf that wanders away from its mother
before being branded.

Read that again, I say, and you sigh,
wrap your left hand behind your head,

raise the book in your right. You’re
the oldest man I’ve ever touched now,

though my eye still traces the path
the muscles forge along your arm.

We’re reading a history, how my ancestors
lost the ranchos—disrupting their dust

as if they hadn’t just settled into the past,
as if their bodies didn’t soften as they aged

and learned to forget. This is the chapter
that follows the drought—

rodeos again being arranged, debts
finally paid, though you and I know

every acre will be lost. Our fingers trace
names left behind on graves,

we speak them aloud as if lowing
will lead us back to the herd.