we’re down to icy slush, footstep-shaped
margins of grass or sodden islands
sudden lakes, squished plastic bags
sidewalk-washed downstream
the dripping we heard overnight a dream-
breath of spring, sheets too warm
the same winter birds but heard
with the door cracked
how things get ugly before getting better
like a healing bruise, the heart
churns, chugs, pumps again and
in winter’s dreg-end we sweep away
the debris
water flat calm, brown
still, winter’s pure opposite—
a heron, wading
someone has decreed:
the fountain stays on
goslings hatched, I find
I missed a month of purple
blossom rained down
now we’re serious
about greenleafing
a still life in geese
on the pale stubble field
necks arched
we are all for the moment
motionless, stunned by sun
a fine day to leave the path
feet crunching wheat-pale turf—
across the glass-hard pond
(surface bliss-blue, willow gold)
this subdued troop of geese
treks on, south and south: sunward
basking roadside, pondside, sun-
side, ignoring thunderous trucks,
whizzing cars, even the thump
and whine of the garbage collector—
but humans are something else
altogether, and all together, uneasy
at my approach, they turn their heads,
long necks, move in smooth unison
closer to the water. A few startle,
take wing at a runner’s passing
breeze, plunge into the pond,
three white furrows and four more
behind, wings wide then down,
tail feathers shaken into place—
and what a goose I am, trail-walking
roadside, pondside, sun-side,
to startle as the first man runs up
and past, and again to turn my head,
uneasy, when the second, walking,
overtakes me.
Graceful Press Poetry 