Chevrotain

"Like a soul tentatively sounding out
a place it might alight."
                 ~ Han Kang, The White Book


Light footfall— imagine 

a cottony trail worked 

by hooves as if 

on tiptoe. 

           Smallest 

in the world, like a wish

that survived the odds.

The underside 

              of day 

is night; then night 

startles alive 

though it has 

               one

unfinished sleeve.