Returned after three years to the lower field, I circle
the rock-cluster island once more, searching the tall
grass for the square indentation of earth
large enough to hold a child or a litter of coyote pups
found once, twenty years ago, and never again
maybe swallowed by the grass now, filled in by slow shifting soil
Another buried fragment of my childhood. But here the buttercups
spread yellow between the stones, as I remember, and the dead
oak still holds court, stooping beneath its twiggy crown.