If I defer the grief I will diminish the gift.
                                                                     -- Eavan Boland

   

1.

 

My parents care what happens

to the killdeer whose nest of eggs

rests in their lawn. They worry

 

about the family in the storms that come.

The four inches that falls in one night,

flooding the roads, the creeks, their yard.

 

My dad wants to harness the silver-

shingled cover of clouds, the warmth

in their electric touch, the very water.

 

To keep the mother alive whose cries overflow

the banks of her throat. To defend her unborn

chicks growing cold from exposure.

 

2.

 

Beaks poke through,

rip in two the mottled fabric of the eggs.

 

Emerge. Tender and tentative,

like buds that one morning decide, finally,

 

to rise from their bed, get dressed.

And then: the fluffing of feathers, the flurry

 

of squeals. Like kids at a birthday bash, cheering

as the piñata breaks open, spills

 

sweets. Life is like that.

It tends to celebrate itself.

 

And my parents run outside to witness

the chicks’ first steps, finding the urge irresistible

 

to crash the party.

 

From Scandal of Particularity, a manuscript awaiting publication.

This poem first appeared in The Basilica Review as “Of Grief and Gift.”

Used here with the author’s permission.