*pursuant to my last submission*

                                 “the places that you’ve come to fear the most” 
                                                                 –       Dashboard Confessional  

Two days passed, and I went to apologize to your remains,
wet grass and strip of flesh and fur, perhaps an ear
yet listening.  What I found was a mouth in the dirt
covered in dead grass, a hollow and sunken lines
of yard beyond.  Hints of tunnels, rising though invisible
to my eyes, from beneath the soil and green. 

“Maybe he…” I started, my friend beside me saying,
“Maybe he…” and I knew before either continued
we’d thought the same.  That maybe you had
escaped the swirling blades I’d been given, the ones
had been given exalted purpose by exalted gods
and a moment.

I only ever found that one ear…so I wonder if you can hear
still, with the one remaining, from deep inside your warren,
(surrounded by your brethren, I hope, and a mother)
and tonight, the two of us saw another, older, (but not so old
as the giant I assume is your mother or father, or
a grizzled veteran of previous owners of this house) so
perhaps your spirits have not fled this space—

we sat under a sky of red and white and blue summer twilight,
my friend and I, and I vowed to watch for you, for that older
rabbit with one ear and a scar, and swore, if I saw you, when
I see you, I will find a way to befriend you, again, and even
bring you inside, to warmth, to love, so that you never grow
so grizzled as our neighbor.  I will atone
for the way I was used.

My friend says it is late and he must leave, but also, before,
that he might be leaving Lexington for a job, a perfect job,
back home.  Him gone—I think about the injured kitten he found
when first we met.  How his love and Capricorn patience has
changed me through the years; taught me poetry and how to break
a line; how to be quiet when healing means rambling; how to listen.

And somehow it all connects.
All makes sense.
If you are here.  If you can hear.
I’m finally there.