Skyblue

Oh squirrel in the cup of the curved pine tree
Wren on the wire, robin in leaves.
A morning’s chatter on this side of heaven
your tails wave questions, your feathered exclamations.

Oh shovel, truck and gun, the heavy wheels,
poison cargo, as I sit here breathing
in this quiet sunrise, children go to sleep,
do not wake, houses float to sea, and mothers

Oh the mothers of everything gather and weep,
write names in stone, remember the dead
light small fires, hunker, broken, fierce, dig
handfuls of sand, in search of what is forever lost

Oh the morning music of white throated sparrow
a minor- keyed miracle, men at work in the seep and suck
of wet mud under our feet, earth in motion, Skyblue
welcomes another day, the turning world.