I told the girl in the shop,
I'm going to name it Rangeley.
She gave me a bored
customer-service smile and told me
yeah, everyone says that.
And I realized that,
if I were at home by my lake,
working at a gift shop,
and some older woman
from far away said
I'm going to name it Silver,
I'd have felt the same.
But still,
the stuffed moose is Rangeley.
And I took him to my hotel,
where I had asked for a water view
And trees, and all the things
I was starved for.
The sun went down.
I knew it would come on my last night,
as it had every night,
and I had glanced at it,
but on the last night,
I stopped still
as the evening turned golden.
And I watched the sun sink,
first a little, sparkling to orange,
and then deep red, and then
the
last
single
ray
behind the pines,
across the now-black water.
And it was cloudy, and there were no stars.
And I took up Rangeley the moose,
and I wept into his synthetic fur.
I don't know how long.
Long enough for my throat to be sore,
and my eyes to burn,
because I was going back to the desert,
and nothing could stop it..