“Bear,” by Linda Gregerson
“I can’t quite tell, so muddy / is the newsprint, whether he’s looking // toward us or away.”
January 5, 2026
I can’t quite tell, so muddy
is the newsprint, whether he’s looking
toward us or away. Woodlands still
in smolder, though
the tree that’s been his refuge has some
needles left. How strong
he must be and how suited-to-purpose
the claws that hold him vertical.
A thousand acres an hour at its height,
so ready was the world on its in-
flection point for just this stroke of lightning.
“Toward us,” I’d imagined, which
is two parts guilt and one part self-importance.
His mother must be frantic, he’s
so very young. The kind of cloud a fire
can make can make a kind of
weather which in turn
can spawn new fires which you
might think is allegorical but is simply
true. We like to think that meaning
has a shape and if we find it we
will be consoled. We call that faith.
Someone took the photograph.
Someone offered water to the
cub. Who did not help the story by
accepting it. Who ran away.
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