Scout E.S. in the Shadows

               A deer with two strong antlers that lead before its eyes, seeing with distance and never close enough to touch with its own fur. Headstrong, chosen not from strength, but fear. What is soft enough to feel its true skin is not worthy of hatred, yet too close for friendship. It runs free from the challenges of wilderness, into roads, and through forest trails. When the night comes, it remembers the mellow colors of the night. The dark blues and gray sky rest the antlers from defense and the eyes take control. What can the antlers see of the beauty of the moon, it asks itself. Nothing, for the shine of the crescent over this world, can only be seen through the two eyes so little used. And as they look to the sky, the wonder of the day leaves from the comfort of the night’s beauty. Its hooves relax and it walks down the rough gravel roads, unaware of its placement in the world it must share. The moon and the stars yell for it to admire them another day, in a different plac

  The sound of chainsaws cradled me to sleep. I had never heard it before, but I knew it would be useful when the seed I planted grew into itself. My acquaintances didn’t see the purpose of comfort beyond their sight, leaving the world vulnerable to the snakes and parasites of the ground. Their sight didn’t extend past the feeble grasses and sickly animals they raised. So many creatures they would watch die, but never did they fear their fate under our feet. I had watched my mother and father give life to the land I shared with the ghosts of our town and how it shriveled and whispered a curse when they died. That wooden home they left me in protected me from the delusion of the permanency of each breath I took, and their last gift injected purpose into my future. The seed. Not any seed; a seed that would grow into a graceful and strong maple tree. As they were wrapped with their unforgiving sheets, ripping away their last layer of living skin, the last gust of lively wind shot the