I smelled you yesterday
for the first time
my nose nestled in your soft hair
plucked from the side of a tree
a buffalo smell
I walked in your meadow
it was vacant
but I found traces of you everywhere
in the white bones and poop piles at my feet
in the mountains that have formed
to your contours in the sacred groves
your ancestors told you about
and in my hand the smell of your hair
thick and almost sweet
it is the scent of what is missing