1

bare nests in gray trees
hold fuzz from chicks pipped feathered
grown flown going gone.

2

robins run amid
bright blades of green drumming worms
to surface for lunch.

3

the eruption of
blooms on the cherry tree sing
of promise renewed.

4

proud labradoodle
with soft mouth carries tree limb
home for inspection.

© Dana Hughes 3.23.15

As it turned out,

the old man walking at a tilt

along the road, with shoulders

hunched high, bare bald head

thrust low between, and knobbed

fingers twined for balance behind

as if he might blow over in a heap

if he stood straight, though there

was no wind to bend him, despite

the sound of leafless limbs in near

trees clacking as they scraped a

bruise upon the patch of sky above,

was a buzzard,

after all, advancing toward the city

that would neither shelter like chicks

beneath a mother’s wings, nor exhale

the breath sucked in when, untied,

the borrowed colt of a donkey

began to bray.

© dana hughes 3.13.15