• It was during one of the long exhausted silences in the cancer ward—between drugged naps, between doctor rotations, my bad prognosis having been made carefully but terribly plain—that I began my theory. It was all about life’s density, not length, I said, addressing your outraged tears. I saw a beaver swimming under the dory on the Green River, then looked up to see a bald eagle snatch a fish. We floated through a canyon of ancient Vishnu Shist, dark and shiny as obsidian. We took turns as you sat at the foot of my bed: we drove through that apocalyptic storm in canyon country, purple lightning blasting sideways through green-glowing thunderheads—rain on one side, clear sunset on the other, throwing hot dusty arms through the windows on the highway to catch the giant raindrops. You saw a tornado of fire jump a valley. I saw a herd of wild horses running across the Mojave. We swam naked, alone as Adam and Eve, in Havasu Falls. Now I hardly remember the hospital room, thin and disposable as a sheet of blue lined paper. I think you held my burning feet to your chest. I forgot to say I saw a pack of wolves in the Yellowstone backcountry with my brother, just after sunrise. The wolves seemed enormous. Seven or eight of them regarded us. When you’re that vulnerable, fear is senseless. I stood looking into the dark one’s eyes. We kept looking. In time the black wolf broke my gaze, and in unison, without a sound, the pack turned down the path and loped away, behind a hill, and left us blinking in the light.

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