Cinnamon and black grey
breaks the summer's doze
the voice gives away
it's sitting somewhere close.

The shade of a mango tree
that rests the wings from sun
breaks the day busy
to a lonely space for one.

In its eyes black bead dark
solitude wears a skin
a sadness makes its mark
of a silent cry within.

It dips beak deep for preens
cleanse that's daily a chore
another day quick spins
shadows are longer more.

Small, different hues of brown
Little black eyes and tiny pink feet
Junco
Eating the seeds on the ground
Inspiring something inside

The next day,
Clear tubes with red perches
Showed off the mix of seeds
Waiting for the first customer
Disappointed when nothing came

The next week,
Losing hope
Still looking, but not as often
Nothing, the one single Junco
Gone

Then that one day
There were two
Hopping off the fence
Onto those little red perches
Draining the tubes of the food
That had been waiting for them

Slowly but surely
More started coming
New birds
New numbers
Sparrows, finches, thrushes, doves

New feeders
New house

Getting the birds back
A new feeder
Filled with nectar
Waiting patiently
Now knowing it could take a while
And then

One day
Watching out the window
Hoping
That one just one might come
Then not one but three!

All in that one day!
Male and female Anna’s
Male Rufous
Zooming and glimmering
Light reflecting off gorgets
Creating the otherworldly hues
Of purple, red, green

In the days that followed
More feeders
More birds
More knowledge
Much more learned

A new hobby
A new love
That will continue
from that day on
Thanks
To that little
Junco

My blood is not red anymore
It is not even rufous
It is achromatic
I’ve seen it go to a watery grave
with moonshine

It drowned
for a foolish fluid  
one so dimwitted
it forgot the word “No”
could be spoken
to bring their negligent ears
into *******

(And not me)

My blood rushed out
In it’s gloom
I wanted to emulate it
and exit my body
just as they entered

What a theft
What a “five-finger discount”
Literally

It was a perfect portrait
A gun kissing the crown of my head
and my indifference
towards the money in the cash register
that I called my soul-case
If I’d even had any left

My lips moldered shut
They don’t like parting anymore
Two buds charred sorely
as a pen
that speaks only in black ink


I searched every crevice of that washroom
for a noose
I found my reflection
and thought that close enough

So there I hovered
hung up on my mirror image
suspended by two claws
honed with dejection

My eyes slammed taut  
My pulse ******* bones in my face
and gnawing itself
with prowling fluorescents

I grazed the scuffs on my thighs
I hadn’t put there
for once

Then I remembered the nausea  
snarled up in their cheeks
Their words like spiders
I don’t know where they’ve gone
and I don’t want to

“Is it that time of the month?’
said the shorter, more truculent boy
and he sniggered

I stood submerged
in hard edged a laugh
that liked to wrench my ears
and make rounds
on nights hot and heavy
with languor

and perhaps,
had I not been so small
or weak of muscle
had I worn a different dress
or forgotten to coat my lashes
had I sipped on tea
instead of *****
I could’ve flagrantly pushed them away
Darted not with my eyes,
but my legs
I could’ve screamed “Get off me you scumbags!”
until my throat shriveled up
into a dried cranberry

But I didn’t

Instead I’m screaming
on a piece of paper

Because the worst that happens here
is a paper cut.

On clear days it rains buckets,
swelling the headwaters
and the algae blooms gluttonous.

Rufous clay breaks into wider trenches
and the towhee flashes away.

You never flinched when I crushed your hand
on that first day on the ****** rise before a charging
buffalo sun, gnat swarming my wild panicked eyes,
giddy with each hill blue upon bluer receding.

I'm a woodland kid, baby, creek crouching
with roots and canteens of sassafras
in the leopard light and leafmold;
the wannabee Tarzan swinging
on wintercreeper vines.
I'm the scurrying rat in the stormdrain,
taking the shortcut home for supper.

But there you were, straight as loblolly pine
in the canyon lands of Chicago, prairie drifted
in with the drifters and the hawk winds
of winter to find the woodland kid dragged
blind before the gridiron sky.

Two rivers led nowhere, two rivers
and a chance confluence of running
merged and pooled in a one bedroom cave
on Belmont, hatching our tadpole dreams,
fattening the swimmers with mustard greens
and gaudy hotdogs.

When we crested the banks,
on the continental divide,
one to the woodland, one to plains,
the water ran as waters do,
and as in each great story,
the boy follows the girl,
to the ****** rise before
the charging buffalo sun,
where you held my hand
and I saw the sky for the first time.

The hatch slides across turquoise waters
hungry eyes watch from underneath
a swishing tail and a surface explosion
causes a flight of glinting wings and yellow bodies.

Chuckling water laughs at me,
as it rushes by through the rocks,
up ahead a cobalt pool waits
deep and smooth as glass.

The mirrored sky reflection
on the still morning's flat water,
reveals to me the teal Kingfisher
watching from the brush.

Silver swirls haunt the shallows,
ghosting motion catches the eye,
green and brown scales suddenly revealed
by the morning sun between the rocks.

Gray green willow branches
dangle in the pristine river,
the Hyperborean water from mountain tops
steam as the sun glints off the surface.

Rufous wings flash in flight
yellow hues are seen through the underbrush
the raucous call of the kiskadee
echoes off the water.