Robins weaving through our yellow lilies.
Cardinals, red as poppies, pirouetting above
our bird bath. My dad calls them messengers,
for those we lost, offering me a glint of comfort.
I think of a young mother in our town snatched
from earth unexpectedly and worry no bird
will be strong enough to carry away a crumb
of her children’s despair. No bird song sweet
enough to echo her voice in the dark. If no
bird’s crest sharpens their memories of her,
if sorrow’s too leaden to budge, let them find
peace in a poem—one preserving the spiritual
trill of birds, words as wings to lift dark stones
of grief, and weave them, twig by twig, a nest.
