A plump robin turns its seed eye
on me suspicious, then agrees I’m not
worth betting on.
The path lights, strangled by a plant
called archangel, click on
and the seeper hoses begin to weep.
A white-crowned sparrow’s melody repeats
and is rejoined with all the notes transposed,
syllables articulated in the western flare.
A neighbor’s hands touch piano keys
as if she were their lover – her favorite
song without words.
I stand up in the backache garden
and share in the summer evening’s relief
at being granted the gift of long shadow.
Lillo Way’s poems have appeared or are forthcoming in New Orleans Review, Poet Lore, Tampa Review, Tar River Poetry, Madison Review, The Sow’s Ear Poetry Review, Poetry East, Roanoke Review, The Meadow and Santa Fe Literary Review, several anthologies. Her manuscript, “Wingbone,” was a finalist for the Barry Spacks Poetry Prize.
