diffuse a colony by default, because our trees were limited.
we are not this residence yet, but should be.
magpied twice as often minus abundance,
these ages openly passerine. accidental,
a perimeter. as sentries stash circumstance.
crow folk, of course, and adaptation
to everywhere even. recognize reflections, yes, visions
of ourselves avian, but unable anyways
to let longer tales catch on. cross the neighbor country
no one means to begrudge but does, magpie.

fly three to four weeks after hatching. mercy.

grown, they aren’t picky with food but hoard
scattered caches carefully. the sown ground.
plus tuck bills beneath feathers for later
roosting, though my tree was lonely. and yours.
that scavenged pocket watch keeping
calendars tidy, unturned. disturbed eggs
cross-country too many miles to defend
too often irreconcilable predations.

y madrone currently lives and works in Chicago, IL via Olympia, WA via Detroit, MI via Baku, Ahzerbaijan. Other work can be found or is forthcoming in The National Poetry Review, RHINO, American Letters & Commentary, Columbia Poetry Review, Cloudbank & So to Speak.

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