Who Looks for You
 

For weeks now, she hoots

from the fir next to our driveway—

a barred owl perched high

where we can’t see her.

Who looks for you, who looks

for you now, she calls

from her hidden roost.

Who looks for you, who looks

for you now, her lifelong mate

replies from a nearby oak.

 

Something about this bird

possesses you and me—

some owling now, a fierce

calling from the warmth

of clutch, the hope of hatchlings,

the promise they’ll one day

nestle broods of their own

and in someone else’s

distant spring, hoot and swoop 

the air of this place, where,

for a time, I spoke your name

and held you close.

                                               

 

Appears in KAKALAK 2015, an anthology

published by Main Street Rag Publishing Co.