Song of the Coyote

On Tuesday I wrote that I would be leading a poetry-writing session with women from my church. Today was that day, and I was immensely pleased and impressed with the variety of poetry that the women in the group wrote and shared. Using some Walt Whitman as a prompt, the "assignment" was to write a poem where you invite someone to come with you to and to share your secret power.

In the wee hours last night while out at the women's retreat at the Oak Glen Retreat Center I heard coyotes, and they were the inspiration for my poem. Here it is:

Song of the Coyote

Listen to the howls of the coyotes.
The song is in them,
  the song is in me.
You do not know it yet, but if you come with me,
If you come with the coyotes into
  the dark of the night
  you will know the song of the
  coyote in you.

We will run with the dark mist
  in our faces as we
  howl a duet
Our tails behind us, rising and dipping

And when we reach the place ...
  we reach that sacred place
where voices and songs of all time
  and before time and voices
  from time yet to come
our song will entwine within
  and throughout
  the communion of
  all breath