Five pound bag of carrots in hand, we set out fresh,
made a morning of it.
Taking our care, stepping tenderly, even on hay,
looking out for dung and sleeping cats.
Equine smells, thick and leathered,
unswept damp corners
buckets, brushes
horse shoes and tack of all sorts,
elemental and strange,
anthropological in their silent disuse.
Entering this house of musky shade and mildewing fodder,
A sanctum for waiting
as the massive heads loomed over us, cavernous
nostrils quivering…
We all but forgot our offering!
On open palms we gifted carrot after carrot.
The briefest touch of bristled muzzle like an electric
shock muffled through velvet.
Exiting the maze of stalls, out into the daylight -
the air moved freely again, and we felt lighter,
even heroic, toward the day.
Having communed with creatures of legend, we left
with their furnaced breath
still warming the empty cups of our hands.
Shannon Reinhardt is a public school teacher and mother who lives in Los Angeles. She enjoys taking neighborhood nature walks, which often inspire a poem.