The Doe’s Body

The Doe’s Body

Tonight, I will sleep inside the carcass of a deer, one mangled by a metal machine. It is disgusting, but it is safe. 

Dawn was young and soft, a thin blue shade just before the sun tipped above the grass. Crickets clicked in the mist while cows lay in the barn as if ready for the slaughter. Even the roosters were quiet, for once.  

There was an early morning peace when I found the doe on the side of the country road, miles of farmland in front of her frail, mangled body. She looked so small, yet she would make a comforting home. 

I have lived in many places during my travels. Inside a tulip, but the bees and the mice wriggled in and forced me out. A burger box, cardboard falling apart, scraps of meat and bread lining the sides. Tasty, but quickly soaked through with rain. Then, a broken teacup, fractured, cold and stained with years of use. I liked that one quite a lot. 

But all places break or get overtaken by Nature. No use settling into a space too comfortably. And so, the deer becomes my new home. For now. 

The doe saw me approaching, her frightened eyes focusing only on me. I must have scared her for a moment, looking so human-like though the size of her eye. She calmed as I pet her nose, her breaths near knocking me over. Her eyes closed slowly, a wheezing sob leaving her lungs. Her head nestled on the ground, a cushioning of moss sending her to sleep. 

I think she liked that I was there. One last friend before her head unraveled, though I have never been good at telling these things. I held my belongings close, just in case her teeth snapped shut on me. Not that I had much to lose: an acorn cap for when it rains, a food-stuffed satchel, a human’s match and a wooden sword that I carved myself.  

First, I lifted her lips and propped her jaw open with my match. Collected the shards of her shattered teeth to carve later. I climbed through the gap into the warm cavern of her mouth. It was endlessly dark, as you would expect, but I grabbed my match and struck it against her teeth. Once the room was lit, the sight of slimy flesh felt oddly welcoming. With a nervous leap, I slid down her throat into the vat of her stomach, catching my sword in the skin of the organ before I could fall into the acid below. Through a rip in her stomach, I pulled myself out. 

One by one, I squeezed past her silky organs like bodies in a crowd. Most of the fluid in her body had drained, so though it was damp, I could breathe in the musty air. Although my flame extinguished, I wandered in the dark, blearily grabbing at nothing until I found bone. 

I climbed her ribs like a ladder, up, up, past her lungs and to her heart just as it pushed blood one last time. Her heart was still warm as I sat by it, heaving to catch my breath. It beat once, twice, then never again. 

It was not easy, carving through the skin of her heart and into the ventricles. From the rip I caused, I could see the cascades of her body like a ballroom of tissue. I can even see the stars from the place in her torso ripped open in her accident. 

It is fascinating to be so small in a creature so large. The doe’s organs are massive pillowy floors, the spine and ribs unending beams holding the ceiling of muscles and skin, and the heart an enormous cavern to hide in. 

Here, in her heart, I wonder if she felt love for her fawns. As I run my fingers across the interior, I cannot tell if it’s the remains of her fluids or love staining my hands. 

Soon, the wolves and vultures will come, and they’ll tear her apart bit by bit. I’ll hide in her heart until it, too, is plucked by hungry beaks. And yet, I will stay. From atop her bloodied skull, I will see the sunrise over the thicket and fog hanging over grass taller than me. Up there, I will drink boiled water from the fire I made in her nostrils. Soon, her eyes will fall out, leaving me a pod to sleep in. 

It may not be forever, but I shall enjoy it while it lasts. If humans let nature be, I will stay here until her bones crumble. I’ll watch as the snow falls and the moss grows over her. Small creatures will snack on the scraps of her flesh as I drink rainwater and cook soup in a bowl carved from her bones. 

And I’ll wander again soon, wherever will hold me next: a sticky soda cup, a dead mole’s cavern, or a hollow oak branch. Wherever the world and the wind take me, I follow. Nothing more to life than appreciating the beauty of it all, of simply surviving. 

For now, I wait here, hidden in the heart of a deer where it is safe. Her tragedy may be my saving, sheltering me from the cold, predators, and evil. So perhaps her death is not so tragic, after all. And maybe when I go, something microscopic will use me, too. And the earth, the world, and the moss will feast on my flesh.  

I could want nothing more for my death, to be loved and used when I am gone. What an honor, I suppose.