MOTHER'S DAY

Somewhere
Up in the weedy Chaparral
A mother grieves. 
On the edge of a Gulch
A baby Bobcat lays
Decapitated.

Likely a Great Horned Owl
Is, even now, savoring its breakfast 
Of still quivering Brains. 
Bobcat mother pondering
Perhaps, that Precarity 
Is coextensive with Birth. 

An awareness bestowed
By her soft dead baby
Whose brief tenure on Earth
Was nevertheless lived
And died
As a fully grievable Being. 

It is Judith Butler who notes
That grievability makes possible
The apprehension of Life.
Without it there is not even
An acknowledgement 
Of Precarity. 

Both are necessary
For the Presupposition
That Life matters. 
Without them there is no Life
There is something Living
That is other than Life.

J.B., Frames of War:
When is Life Grievable? 2016