Potent Medicine Poem by Sonny Rainshine

He followed the tracks
down to where the wild azeleas
staged their drama
in pink jackets and perfume.

He’d heard wildcats
had been spotted
along the pungent banks
of Pearl River,
licking their paws
after a kill
among the cyprus stumps
rising there.

It was an overcast day,
a day when fishing was pointless
and worries that usually
simmered in the background
surfaced like goldfish
to nibble at his equilibrium.

It was a day
he needed to be amazed.
It was a day
he had to see a wildcat.