This boy would dart off before dawn,

climb trees, examine eggs, take out

his little pencil and draw the birds in flight.

 

When I’d meet him at the arbor with tea

and cookies, he’d share the bounty

of pockets; egg shells, nests of curling

 

leaves, feathers of every color. So what

if his cheeks stayed smudged and he rarely

made it in time for supper? For those

 

of you who’ll say, he was not yours,

I ask you: does the earth not belong

to the sky? Does the shore not love

 

the ocean, even as it crashes upon it?

does the bluebird not sit on the nest,

even if the egg is specked instead of pale?

 

From The Color of Lost Rooms (Blue Rooster Press, 2010).

Awarded the Writer’s Digest 19th Annual Self-Published Book Prize for Poetry.

Used here with the author’s permission.