Jawbone

She pulled a jawbone out of the sand,
and held out her hand, it looked to me
like it was from a dead coyote.
She made it into a necklace using colorful
string and when she wore it she always said
it made her stronger.

The loud semis parked crookedly
in the empty parking lot drove her crazy.
The rent was cheap though,
and the price of being stuck
absorbed our every waking hour.

The smell in the air was sour, a bloody
mound of dead rats torn up
with shotguns just a little before
we walked by. We saw the casings
and it was odd that they were left there.
We met someone around that place before,
and he told us about a wolf he shot
four times but couldn’t kill.

I watched her down the hill from me
dragging her fingers through the sand
on the bank of the pond.
Looking for more death
that she could keep for herself,
and finding as much as she wanted.