You feel their presence as night absorbs the camp.

Sitting at the fire, watching the rise and fall of campfire light on pine bark, you do not forget that one could walk out of those trees while you are sleeping.

They trail into your dreams and keep your dogs up most of the night, listening, staring, growling, at something out in the tall lodgepole.

You wake often and check to make sure the meadow is clear. Then settle back and stare up at tree silohouttes reaching into thousands of stars. Shooting stars appear, get lost behind the pines, and reappear to burn themselves away.

A severe chill rouses you a final time, to find that the black sky has transformed to predawn cream.

You witness the stars fade into the promise of another unbounded Wyoming day . . .

in this land where Grizzly and Wolf walk the valleys and timberland,

wild through the night.