There must be freedom hearing coyotes
chase the wind, the meaning of
cranes before their enraged flush.
The bear has caught your scent and the raven
answered you fifty-seven times.
It was a long trip
to the Dunes Saloon for a few
coyotes in their restless fire so that
shaking hands with the three-quarter
moon it occurred to me that the birds
needed renaming.
I was entitled to a little wine and a specific
glory of becoming a small brown bird.
From pages 67-68 of The Raw and the Cooked: Adventures of a Roving Gourmand by Jim Harrison (Grove Press, 2001).