Aki and I are out to wrack more seaweed. She wanders near the car while I walk over to the top of a low bluff to check a pocket beach. A cabal of ravens scatters into the air when I reach the bluff edge. Still hunkered on the beach, an immature bald eagle doubles its apparent size by forming parenthesis with expanded wings. I have time to notice how his umber body is spattered with white feathers before he flies to roost in a nearby Spruce. The birds have left behind a deer carcass.

The severed deer head, without antlers or eyes rests on the hind withers. Birds have pealed back the thick brown coat to expose the intact bone structure of the back, ribs, and neck. The fur lies like a rumpled blanket over the deer’s hindquarters. Scavengers have consumed the internal organs and picked the uncovered bones clean of most of their meat.

The bones have a durable beauty, especially the symmetrical curving ribs and long bend of the neck. I try not to acknowledge how human the rib cage looks from the side. Instead I remember watching a deer swim toward this beach followed by a sea lion. The deer made the beach just before the sea lion and stood panting, head bent low between the kayaks we were about to launch. Why did I find you now, when I just finished reading the deer-hunting essay from Nelson’s The Island Within? Seeing deer hunting as an offering, not a taking, Nelson showed nothing but respect when cleaning the deer that have given itself to him. Unless it died of natural causes, I fear that who ever shot this deer wasted most of the meat.

The eagle and ravens complain about our presence at their precious find. They will return to their picking as soon as we leave, gently pushing back the blanket of fur to expose more and more flesh, devouring the exposed until only scavengers with smaller tools will be able to continue the harvest. It is this scavenger’s communion that will salvage meaning from the deer’s death.

Walking a creek valley bounded by two mountain walls on a sunny day can be frustrating. Aki and I are in shadow, sliding along an informal trail. We cross a leafy bench big enough to accommodate one troll family or a village of hobbits. The little dog seems to be searching for evidence of both. Sunlight is doing some special things to Mount Juneau on our left, intensifying the red and yellow of dog wood leaves and spotlighting bare cottonwoods. Low angled light underlines their longest limbs in shadow as they reach to the south. I start singing, “They are leaning out for love and they will lean that way forever.” Aki stares as if she can see the Leonard Cohen ear worm enter my brain. I sing about Suzanne, with her tea and oranges all the way from China as we climb up the trail and into the sun.

The plan was for a quick walk through the woods on gravel paths. I wore my city coat and good wool cap. We ended up in a swamp of misery. Aki had no problem negotiating the moss-covered ground. She slipped under the tangle of bare blue berry brush and tilting, moss covered alders. I pushed through it, feeling moisture seep into my boots as I cursed my way through the mess. I should have cursed the duck hunter hunkered down on the beach across the easy path to the car. I might as well have cursed the wind for covering another part of the trail with windfalls or the coyote that left the tracks I followed into the swamp.

Pulling aside a stout limb I saw a blue berry, round and alone on the leafless bush except for a clinging raindrop. Should I eat the rain washed berry or leave it for wild things? I moved on, fingers innocent of berry juice. We made it out of the swamp. Moss and mud clung to my jacket and rain pants. Aki fine gray hair was moist but clean. She smelled like the forest, like she spent the morning at a cleansing spa.