the rabbit was young in her the beginning of something the burden of continuation locked inside
she found a small spruce sheltered from the deepest snow its limbs nimble bending
she nipped the tenderest parts returning day after day
by spring the spruce was a nub no chance of height or spreading roots
soon her little ones will turn toward her
Mary Buchinger is the author of /klaʊdz/ (2021, Lily Poetry Review Books), e i n f ü h l u n g/in feeling (2018, Main Street Rag), and Aerialist (2015, Gold Wake) and two forthcoming collections, Navigating the Reach (Salmon Poetry) and Virology (Lily Review Books).Her work has appeared in AGNI, Boston Globe, Gargoyle, Interim, Massachusetts Review, On the Seawall, [PANK], phoebe, Plume, Salamander, Queen Mob’s Teahouse, and elsewhere. She is president of the New England Poetry Club and teaches at the Massachusetts College of Pharmacy and Health Sciences in Boston.
