Welcome back, June. Let's DO something....

I liked the productivity of April, poetically speaking, so I thought I'd try the "Poem a Day" pledge again. I make no promises as to quality, but I pledge to try and get one poem a day on here. Meanwhile, here's a revision as a warm-up:

Crow

Encased in plastic, glass and metal,

windows up and safe within the artificial

bubble of music and filtered air,

I slammed into the real world today

when seven sparrows crossed my path

in a rush, swooping around the lone black hoodlum

of a crow, naked sparrow babe dangling from it’s mouth.

No lion downing a gazelle or wolf pack dropping an elk

could have been more dispassionate than that crow,

unflappably winging its way across my windshield

to Pink Floyd’s wailing guitar. The movie that played there

was witness to a snapshot of a desperate family’s

vain attempt to save the life of one of its children.

If they succeed, I thought as our paths diverged, then what?

No feathered hand could lift that defenseless infant back

to the warmth under mother’s wing again. No NSPCA

member would tell the other predators

in the bushes to stand down. No downy hero

would wait below to break the fall.

I take a shallow breath now for this

one tiny, naked victim in a large tragic world.

We will all be alone in the beak of our own crow one day,

no matter how many loved ones circle us

or cry out, mute on the other side of the glass.