The Greek Statue Driving the Bulldozer

My husband was driving late into the night.

We were in the middle of Missouri

when I looked out the passenger window,

and I saw something I couldn't believe:

a Greek statue of a woman

sitting inside an abandoned bulldozer.

I knew I mistook something,

likely a mess of branches and flora

or a swirl of shadows,

but for a moment

I entertained the vision.

I daydreamed

about the Greek statue; I imagined

her driving the bulldozer.

The world at her fingertips. She could

do anything,

and she picked destruction. She hides in the night,

wears a headdress to blend in with the shadows.

What omen does she preach? Does she know

some secret about my world?

Her big sad eyes,

the expressionless lips,

the sharp, distinct nose.

A woman of a chanting circle,

a woman who worshipped

at The Temple of Artemis, one

of the Seven Wonders

of the Ancient World.

A woman

who hunts,

who names the animals,

the Moon her guide,

the wilderness

her sanctuary.

***

Not far from there,

a deer stumbled onto the road.

He stood frozen

in the headlights

of my husband's car.

The cypress trees

shed their leaves

between the deer

and the car.

The deer

as if trying

to tell us something,

as if telepathically

whispering

of the things to come.