Five baby geese
Fresh from their eggs
Up and about
On ten little legs.
Covered with down,
They stumble a bit
And bumble along
On legs that don’t fit.
Vulnerably cute,
They adorably squeak
As they’re struttin’ around
Seekin’ food for their beak.
With luck, they’ll all make it
To gander and geese
Doin’ their part,
Their species increase.
The poor little warbler,
No longer will fly,
Soar toward the heavens
On wings through the sky.
Her attention diverted
Or simply confused
By the window before her
On the path that she cruised.
She made quite a thump
When her head hit the glass
And she fell to the ground,
The wee little lass.
I tried to revive her,
I stroked her and such,
But her body refused
To respond to my touch.
If fledglings she has,
They’ll go it alone -
Her flying days ended,
Her last mission flown.
It’s usually fluffy
And dry to the core –
Alfalfa and grasses,
Fescue and more.
Supplied by the Amish
To feed and sustain,
The equine triumvirate
That rules on my plain.
But the fields aren’t yielding,
The weather’s been bad –
As cold as the Arctic
And drier than Chad.
So supplies are diminished
And all that remains
Is the damp and dusty
Baled up grains.
Hard on the horse’s,
Their breathing impairs,
When eating inhaling
Through noses that flare.
But they’ve got to eat,
It’ll just have to do;
‘Til the harvest is kinder
Hay lesser they’ll chew.
Ladies and gentlemen
We begin a new day -
The morning has broken,
The night gone away.
The dawn of whatever
Your mood may desire,
Stretched out before you
To mother or sire.
To grow and to nurture,
Fulfill and to keep -
A day full of hope,
And promise to reap.
The sun’s in the sky
Wade in and begin -
On the shores of forever
The tide’s rollin’ in,
Deafening thunder
And lightning that flies,
A dog in the bathtub
Shuddering cries.
Under a tarp
Another dog lies –
A table for picnics,
Keepin’ her dry.
The horses all stand
In mud to their shins,
Outside of a barn
Just soakin’ it in.
A herd of small deer
Are spooked into flight
Seeking new shelter
To shelter their fright.
Storm warnings fly,
Tornadoes are near,
The rain pourin’ down
On the ol’ biosphere.
Hydrogen oxide
Everywhere poured,
Sustaining the earth
And all those aboard.
They’re nuts for this mushroom,
Psychedelic it’s not -
But tasty and scrumptious.
The best nature’s got.
By the pound, forty bucks,
An investment in time
That pays for itself
If you don’t mind the grime.
They’re found in the marshes,
Where muddy and damp,
And they flock to the northland
To set up their camp.
In search of the Morel,
A mushroom so fine
The harvest produces
A taste that’s divine.
Alone or in couples,
In armies they creep
Along every roadway
Where muck’s runnin’ deep.
The talk of the town,
‘How’s the huntin’ so far?”
But a secret is kept
Of the places they are.
In a couple of weeks,
The excitement draws down
The mushrooms are gone
Or moulded to brown.
And the hunters return
To wherever they hail,
To cook up the fruit
Of their harvesting pail.
My dog’s runnin’ wild,
She’s free as a breeze –
She howls in the distance
Through a forest of trees.
Unable to catch her,
Avoidance her gift –
No trust in her master,
A loner adrift.
But she wanders beyond
The home that she claims
And the neighbors are restless,
Their passion enflames.
She’s disturbing their chickens,
Annoying their deer,
Frightening their puppy,
Fed up now, it’s clear.
So it’s off to the vet
For some meds and a way
To drug her to slumber,
Her wandering allay.
To catch her and keep her
In kennels reposed,
Or she’s gonna be killed
With a bullet imposed.
Pecked on the cheek
By a robin gone mad –
In a flurry of feathers,
Launched from her pad.
A tank short of propane
And nearly run dry,
Her presence unknown,
Unsuspecting was I.
The meter sequestered
Beneath a dome top,
I lifted it up
To see when it’d stop.
Disturbing the bird
And a family of eggs
Incubating away
So they grow some legs.
Straight at my face,
Determined she was
To protect every egg
With her beak and her claws.
Inflicting her imprint
On a cheek she escaped –
Took flight from the scene
And leaving it scraped.
A bird brain she has,
But her eyes, they can see -
A battle prolonged
She’d not have with me.
I returned the dome top,
An aluminum lid -
Her blue bonnet eggs
Were once again hid.
Protected from harm
By a daring young mum -
No omelet they’d be,
Her fledglings to come.
Beyond the twilight’s final grasp,
Outside the moonlight’s fall,
Shifting shapes ambiguous
Upon the bedroom wall.
Pirouettes on plasterboard
Dancing through the night;
Sequenced by the universe
In fitful, fleeting flight.
In motion unobstructed,
The movement unrestrained,
No modesty or consciousness,
Existing self-contained.
A ballerina at the barre,
The graceful artist’s dance,
Staged upon the empty walls
Of playful circumstance.
He’s done it again,
You’d think that he’d learn –
He stumbles in pain
And aches when he turns.
A dash from the deck
To jump in the car
Through the hatch in the back
But now he sees stars.
The hatch wasn’t opened
He bounced like a ball –
Careened from the glass
In a haphazard fall.
He possesses two eyes,
He’s clever, not slow;
Anxiety blindness?
I really don’t know.
He gets rather hyped
When it’s time for a ride
And nothing will stop him
From getting inside.
Perhaps he believes
That the will overcomes –
If you see and believe,
Assured it becomes.
But the physics defy
His soul’s inner call –
And the grace of his leap’s
A calamitous fall.
All mothers warn
To look ‘fore you leap -
At motherhood’s wheel,
His mother asleep.
Flanigan\'s Farm
Number of photos:11
Total size:1.83 MB