I am not afraid when you call me down. Down the basement steps under the house. Down, down in the ground. White cows are limping. The black dog barks. Crickets are screaming. Smoke in the barn. Just like a field snake eating a mouse. Just like a blue gill, hook through its mouth. Cry for the toy trains lost in the snow. Cry for the dead deer surrounded by crows. You call me softly down in the dark. Down where the red worms circle like sharks. Under the black mud in your quiet house you have prepared my place to lie down. A house in the rock where sorrows drown. Old man or baby make no more sound.