built of tarmac road and
lizard king his song was
the end of summer,
the last summer where
the light had to leave but
somehow he left us fused to
it, intoxicated, blown
forever into our
subconscious minds
where it sunk like the
anchor of a ship.

the summer
melts into corners
and doors, unsettles
its ghosts.

the flowers blush
and burgeon, wild
grasses blow in the
wind.

the sun shrinks the
land, blasts the heathers
with their purple blooms.

everything seems to
be blossoming, the clouds,
the sky, even our love.

the summer’s great lizard hides
under a rock,

the summer sings of ending days, of
lonely horizons and crystal seas,

we smoulder in the sunshine
where the clouds flow in their

drifting streams, their ridges like
colossal ledges on the mountains

of the world.

My sister – camping on the coast
Muttering over macaroni
Fixing salad
Talking to a seagull

“George” mews like a cat
awaiting dinner
Waddling web-foot along the stony cliff
To him – life is a handout
against the backdrop of the setting sun
Garlic bread, spaghetti, chocolate chip cookie –

My sister adopts things
What was ever wild after?
Even this “Master of the Wind”
eats Italian tonight!

Till the “Alpha Bird”
younger stronger
spots the eye of orange on plate of white –
Whirls in on protest and demand
George responds in kind
Intruder seizes a meatball
George squawks and lunges
his last...
_

The sunset on the Maine coast tonight
enthroned in vaporous haze
Imbued with fragrance-- ocean rose
The sky-- delicate
mountain laurel pink
bleeding into purple
where the tallest spires of spruce
have stabbed upward
From the coastline's rock
comes qweedling of the robins
calls of sea birds in the peaceful distance....
__

        ….George struggles in Alpha's grip
on windpipe
Meal forgotten
as nature serves its worst
His neck arched back
Wings fluttering desperate
in his last display
a spray of feathers
Strength will take this day
Plunge it into faint squawks
George dissolves limp in quivers

as Alpha--
weightless victor
lifts away

Suzy cries out
despair at loss of little friend
        “I can't! I can't!

I rush out to hold  
his last limp sigh

...tossing his gray and white into another sky

summer has burned up,
blown past, the thermometer
sinks stone-like, its silvers
dulled in metal tombs
no longer spiking red.

the wet leaf hangs lower
on the twig, the bird balances
on the branch, the day
fragments, its grey clouds
flowing under swiftly
closed doors.