Dead newt missing a leg

on the trail swarmed

by ants, a hundred

acupuncturists.

The jack-hammer 

woodpecker away.

Mathias understood

that the white speckles

on the fawn in a nest

of dead leaves–trick

of mottled light through live

green leaves. Bare rock,

the bluff’s crown–eye-level

with canopy. The sway

of branches like highway traffic–

a muffled roar of semis.