Large Fierce Mammal

First published on October 26, 2011

Hunter’s Moon

By LFM

By light of moon a hunter came
Snow shod through winter woods,
Bound home from hunt and trading trip
For meat and needful goods.

Moon shadows of bare birchen limbs
Lay cast across the trail
That led to hearth and home and wife,
And respite from travail.

His dearest Meg prayed for him there,
By day and lonely night,
Beloved mother soon to be,
Fair keeper of his light.

The trail behind lay six weeks long,
Ahead, but half an hour,
And knowing this he felt his legs
Recharged with newfound power!

The knoll that rose above the glen
Wherein the cabin stood
Was where, at last, the hunter came
To stand beside the wood.

And though his heart cried out for haste,
And though he longed to run
Into his dear Meg’s loving arms,
He clutched, instead, his gun.

For though he longed to hold his Meg,
And hungered for her kiss,
He felt his heart freeze in his chest,
For something was amiss.

Long time there he stood and watched
The cabin ‘cross the snow.
He saw no chimney smoke arise,
No warming lantern’s glow.

He eased his pack down on the snow,
He loosed his axe and knife,
And with his rifle leveled
Made his way down to his wife.

Drawing nigh he saw the door
Stood open to the night,
Racing in he screamed her name
And found a ghastly sight.

Every place the moon could cast
Its light upon the floor
Revealed a place of slaughter there,
Festooned with blood and gore.

His rifle clattered from his hands,
He called again for Meg,
Then stumbled to the hearth lamp and
Retrieved it from its peg.

With shaking hands he lit the wick,
Then fell upon his knees.
“Til well past dawn his screams were carried
Miles upon the breeze.

He never knew how long he screamed,
Nor how he came to bed,
But when he woke the sun was up,
Meg’s dress beneath his head.

Rising up, he stumbled to
The thing that broke his mind.
The butchered, hanging, parts of Meg,
So perfectly aligned.

Tears were streaming down his face
As piece by piece he took
Each desecrated piece of flesh
From each and every hook.

No tender flesh for cannibals
Would hang when they returned.
Instead there’d be a smoking hole
Where he and Meg had burned.

The smell of coal oil filled the air,
He kissed his Meg good bye.
The hunter checked his rifle’s load,
And settled back to die.

T’was as he made to light their pyre,
He looked across the floor
And saw a small familiar thing
He’d somehow missed before.

To the corner’s shady gloom
The hunter made his way,
And seeing what it was, he knew
His duty was to stay.

A tiny skull with spine attached
Lay chewed upon the wood,
And vengeance filled the hunter’s mind
To cleanse the Earth for good.

And so the tiny fragment joined
Its mother once again,
And father hunter set about
To play host in his den.

By light of moon the monster came
Up to the cabin door,
But as it entered in it knew
All wasn’t as before.

A thundrous sound rang through the night,
Its head blew from its neck,
The wendigo collapsed in place,
A bloody twitching wreck.

And barely had the body twitched
Its last out of this life,
The hunter fell upon it with
His axe, his saw, and knife.

The hunter plied his trade and cast
To Meg a soulful look,
Then he hung each monster part
From each and every hook.

That night another shot rang out
As fire took them all,
But the hunter saw the monster sent
From Earth to Judgement’s call.