December 2016
I worked more than 30 years as an engineering editor at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. Roles before academia included psychiatric tech/caseworker and nursing home evaluator. My most recent writing has appeared in Star 82 Review, Anima, Right Hand Pointing, and Verse-Virtual. I live near Madison, Wisconsin. My 5 adult children and 3 grandchildren live nearby.
My Fellows, To Spring
Ice lines the gutters.
Streets steam with grumbling cars.
Night's defiled all the snow piles--
Am I the last songbird in town?
Harsh voices rail from storm clouds,
battering doors, rattling bones.
Songs can't crack shuttered windows.
Houses creak, burdened by cold.
Wanted dead (like merciful words):
every last songbird around.
Out of step, out of season, spent--
say the lamppost fliers, flapping.
In a get-up cobbled from a dumpster,
I'll sneak from this frost-bitten place.
My fellows gather at the outskirts,
raising songs to reclaim fair weather.
Hope Springs
I await you, loon.
To fathoms five and more
your headlong plunge—
the world turns,
the surface smooths,
lowly water bugs
skate a victory lap.
The plane begs breaking.
And it will. It must.
But where, loon?
When?
©2016 Darrell Petska
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