Sunday Poem

SPRING 

the hawks are out hunting mice in grass past gold
now brown, dry and dead, the hawks, humourless
hunt, merciless and I miss you, done with waiting 

the mice cowering, then shitting paths scooting past
trying to get something to eat, getting et instead—I miss you
I said. puddles in the fields and raptor's wide arcs 

circles, patience—shadows inscribing the water
so the ducks and scoters scatter on the creek bulge
take to air awkward, half-winged, scurry and regroup 

red-tails and kestrels on the power lines glare at the grass
the steely creek, the cows hock-deep in melt-off—I 
miss you—waiting for the strike, for feathers to fall, hunting

or watching—wanting only to be fed: birds staring
groundward, me staring skyward: weeping
or bleeding out, wary, it's all been said.

From Dirt of Ages (2012) by Gillian Wigmore.