When we first moved into this house next to a sizable woods seven years ago a porcupine lived in a huge pine tree next to the old barn. He would come down in the late afternoon to graze on the grass. I became attached to him and eventually he would not bother about me getting within two feet of him as he grazed. Two years later one autumn afternoon he suddenly reared onto his back legs, sniffed the air as he looked intently into the woods, and shot out like the proverbial bat in a manner light years away from his customary slow waddle. I never saw him again and especially grieved over porcupine road kill and stuffed porcupines in museums and naturalist centers. Today while hiking through the woods I heard something rustling the fallen leaves.

Indian summer
a porcupine has come down
to the river