Reeds cower their disappointments below

the scummy marsh waters,

still green but amber-tipped, they lean

like wounded soldiers in a sanitarium.

They know they haven’t much time,

but hang on to the last tendrils

of wan light seeping between

the alders and birch, their leaves

scandalously displayed like hammered tin

on the tips of their limbs.

 

The bog has swallowed the lake,

mossy green like over steeped tea.

Whatever lives there is dream filled

and sluggish. I feel their pain,

white and sterile as the sun that loosened

the branches with summer’s heat.

The cat is crouching, ready to pounce

beneath the birdfeeder, little

lioness in her collar of fur, taunted

by blue jays and chickadees.

 

Cool as a diva among her admirers,

proud and almost too slim to see,

a crane steps lightly along the shore

on awkward knees, so regal she believes

she’s a swan, the lake’s prima ballerina.

Ring after ring widens on the surface,

pocked with zig-zagging insects;

I no longer see her in a god-light;

my life ticks along with such regularity

I hardly notice her at all.

​