spring: bulldozer and white bird - David Beckman

[Larry Robinson]

spring: bulldozer and white birds

the 1959 Ford bulldozer
last pushed ants' nests, tree-stumps
and a bag of old shoes
then came to rest, 
abandoned for five decades 

but today seven egrets soared 
in at seven angles to alight 
on its engine cover and wait -- 
three spreading wings to catch
sunheat, three debating wind-drift,
one taking notes.

At 4:15 they arose 
and dispersed over a meadow green with
spring buds -- four marveling at dragonflies,
two puzzled by squirrels,
one memorizing hillscapes

then careened across
a church steeple to land
near a pond
for a symposium
on breeding and tadpoles.

At dusk they rose
to the roofpeak of an abandoned house 
-- three content that
at dawn sun's peek-a-boo rise will
come as always, three unmindful
of the prospect, and one asleep
on one leg
dreaming of mice.

	- David Beckman