<html><head><meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=us-ascii"></head><body style="word-wrap: break-word; -webkit-nbsp-mode: space; line-break: after-white-space;" class=""><div dir="auto" style="word-wrap: break-word; -webkit-nbsp-mode: space; -webkit-line-break: after-white-space;" class="">The Kookaburras<div class=""><br class=""></div><div class=""><div class="">In every heart there is a coward and a procrastinator.</div><div class="">In every heart there is a god of flowers, just waiting</div><div class="">to come out of its cloud and lift its wings.</div><div class="">The kookaburras, kingfishers, pressed against the edge of </div><div class="">their cage, they asked me to open the door.</div><div class="">Years later I wake in the night and remember how I said to them,</div><div class=""><i class="">no</i> and walked away.</div><div class="">They had the brown eyes of soft-hearted dogs.</div><div class="">They didn't want to do anything so extraordinary, only to fly</div><div class="">home to their river.</div><div class="">By now I suppose the great darkness has covered them.</div><div class="">As for myself, I am not yet a god of even the palest flowers.</div><div class="">Nothing else has changed either.</div><div class="">Someone tosses their white bones to the dung-heap.</div><div class="">The sun shines on the latch of their cage.</div><div class="">I lie in the dark, my heart pounding.</div><div class=""><br class=""></div><div class=""><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>- Mary Oliver</div></div></div></body></html>