Page 19--Mating--Alexa Langrock

Under the porch a porcupine sprawls, strips their prickly skin and lays their pinky newborn flesh down into a quilt of woodchips, hums the kind of lullaby hum a momma porcupine might sing for their baby porcupine. But this hum is not a lullaby, this hum comes before that one, this hum is for the porcupine that nestles under the neighbor’s porch; steps out of their prickles, too. The neighbor’s porcupine hums back, a deep throaty catcall psalm, until the hums fuse together, knotted as a ball of twine, the beating of a single heart.