CLARITY,

The doe you hit with your car two autumns ago. You tried to swerve, but of course that made it worse. She died whimpering, stuck to the front of your car. 

You pulled her from the grill. When you hit a deer, no one tells you about the hair that gets plastered, matted with lipids and blood, to the headlights. That you have to drive an hour to the next city barely able to see the road, lights orange on the asphalt. You were driving just a little too fast, weren’t you? That can be our little secret. 

No one tells you that you have to scrape the skin from your bumper, because the car wash couldn’t get it all. No one knows that there’s still some blood rusting on your rims, that you couldn’t be bothered to scrub off. 

Was the word, her last word, her name? Was she simply grateful to her executioner?  She is survived by you, and you alone. That can be our little secret.