First Snow

A snow-bright morning. Crows, ducks, kingfishers. Glowing spots on the mountains where the sun shines through brilliant clouds. All this on a day that our leaders discuss whether or not we, Americans, will give ourselves permission to torture. Whether we will step even further from the international community.

These ducks passed over the guns of hunters. Now they settle together on this river in the center of the city. They will be fed through the winter by the river and human children bringing bread and popcorn. The crows circle and argue for the leftovers. Bird feeders, put away from bears in the summer, reappear for all the backyard birds.

As our president flies back from a South American summit, his plane crosses the paths of migrating flocks going south. Our soldiers come home in pieces. They leave behind them enemies and friends; the guilty and the innocent dead.

Around the world, birds are slaughtered and tested for plague.  Birds acknowledge no boundaries, not those of nations or geography. Plague ignores even the boundaries of species. All are at risk -- our wild birds, our domesticated pets, and our cruel and untamed selves. 

Comments

[jenett]

a brilliant piece and thanks for the beautiful sky...

[Kimberly]

Your writing is poetry even when you frame it as prose. Beautiful.