AFTER MIDNIGHT, COWS
				    
	After Midnight, Cows

made a break for it,
figured it'd be easy
once they got clear of the stalls
and past the wire.

They figured,
after that, the world is all
green and brown
pastures and hills and silage

not 
this
south Omaha

of rock-packed roads,
bars and gas stations,
houses surrounded 
by the smallest fields imaginable.

Hell of a miscalculation,
all the stars snuffed, just bright eyes
hanging everywhere; no grasses
tall enough to disappear in;

lost beasts wondering
who put this world out here,
this petrified landscape
of thunder and blood?