Learning to Live with the Cows

by Janice Townley Moore

I did not want them to come here,
afraid of their large square heads
some with horns,

their soft eyes no recompense.

So I keep my distance,
glimpse them from the kitchen window
as they saunter to the watering tub.

I watch them at the fence
and for the first time see
what the grass is greener really means.

I learn that all those painted cows
in distant fields
were moving their mouths.

I learn that trees are for
scratching up against.

And on dull winter afternoons
I imagine that the cows rise
from what is left of the grass,
dance to a music I do not hear,

something basso and sprightly
seeping from their udders,
sailing out of their horns.

Learning to Live with the Cows is in Janice's chapbook, Teaching the Robins, published by Finishing Line Press, 2005.