Petra Salazar
a pack of coyotes
dragged a drowned
child from the river
yelping
yapping
yips
they licked the salt
from her eyes shocked
open drank from the dark
well of her mouth
scattered by the rattles
wrapping her
in undulating
scales
hissing water
from her lungs
uncoiled
breathing
sleeping
child
warmed by sand
& sunset blood
on red cliffs
listen
your mother
wails up river
roused
she stood
& ran far
in the other
direction
***
Petra Salazar is a coyote (regional term for an Indohispano/Anglo racial identity) from Española, New Mexico aka “Spaña.” They teach children at a Montessori school and adults at philopoetics.com. Petra’s work has been published or is forthcoming in Colorado Review, Indiana Review, Sonora Review, The Southampton Review, Latin American Literature Today, and elsewhere.