Kentucky
Breeds

Josie Levin

a storm came for the horses, the winter of ‘37
came and riled them up and swallowed them down

Grandmama told me Lexington mares,
prized and brokenlike, would run loose up the driest hill
in Fayette county, where she rode them or wanted to
before stable hands took them down

she said to me, nails hoof-tough in my palm
if you love something you’ll want to put a bell on it
and if it loves you back, it will stand very still
and let you

Back before December she didn’t believe her daddy
when he showed her which bones gave glue
But then came January, and the smell of it
was in the coats, ginlike
and damning

the winter all the horses went climbing, even the gentle
mares spooked when the sky started clapping,

In February’s chevaline she saw the finest derby stallions
chuff their own ankles to get to hilltop
the more expensive breeds never got real loose
only spit in the roads and washed up in the front yard

Grandmama tells me they raised her foullike
from the stick
and not the reins

And when the whole state finally flooded, the broken horses
herded themselves to high ground
and still drowned