I push everything I know off to the side.
For a moment I watch these two predators,
fiddling and flapping, bracing on thick branches; letting go
in the stiffening foliage of my ash tree.
It’s November. They are black as Syrian oil.
I listen to their dialog. Caw resonates deep in the gullet.
Like the ruffle of shuffling playing cards, it starts slow,
punctuated by the final fan-slap as the last card folds the deck,
then the quiet roulette of dealer’s hands.
I imagine what they might’ve said: Passion,
a bargain? Scolding or rolled eyes over chores,
divvying seed? Who was wrong…who was right?
“Caw,” is the end of a sentence.
I do not Bird, but in this
aging moment, I wish I did.
One to the other over the fussing
and how significant or not,
it would all mean in the end.
I wonder if I could learn Raven,
a dialect of Bird, one of thousands,
perhaps, tens or hundreds of thousands.
No. Millions. And if I could begin –
even just begin, nothing more for now.
To understand, what new worlds?
“Ravens” is part of “Late Snow and Hellebore” Melinda Rizzo’s first full-length book of poetry, published in 2019 by Kelsay Books and available on Amazon, along with an animated reading of Pushcart Prize nominated “Ravens.” She is a longtime reporter, writer and poet, and the editor and features writer for Area Guide to Homes & Gardens, the weekly home, garden and real estate section of Bucks County Herald.
Poet’s Corner is curated by Bucks County Poet Laureate Tom Mallouk and supported by a grant to the Bucks County Herald Foundation made possible by Marv and Dee Ann Woodall.
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