The Crows

John Bruce

The crows are moving closer to the house
The meadow is so green I can put my hand through it
The quick, short flight, the wind-up walks
Of our spring birds clutter the lawn.
I have a thicket of complaints to air
After the winter. I try to look ahead.
The crows repeat my anxious shibboleth
Their black words more like knives.
I caw at them, they tilt, pause, rise
Graceful and forbidden, inked
Axioms of their careful moves:
Older than my species, I think,
Standing at the window cooled
By the paper thin idea of tomorrow.

Poems selected and prepared by Hugh MacCallum and Ian Lancashire.

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John Bruce's works copyright © to the author.