You can’t reason with a man 
wielding a rifle, one who thinks he holds 
a title to the sky, begrudges birds 
their flight. An eagle always looks you 
in the eye. Even when it’s maimed, 
one wing hanging at an awkward angle, 
it’s still fierce and unafraid. Look at this 
one, standing on my glove, almost ready now 
to fly. He’s shifting from one foot to another, 
stretching his wings. I know these birds don’t 
belong here, taking bloody bits of rabbit 
from my hand. When they’re ready they will go.

In a small town, sheltered in the shadow 
of a mountain, the turtles make their yearly
journey, trundling like tiny tanks across the road, 
making front page news. It isn’t the procession’s 
length or stately pace that draws attention, 
but the carnage made by pickups full of hay, 
school buses packed with squealing children. 
By migration’s end, the trail is bloody, strewn 
with shattered shells, slick with guts. 
The turtles aren’t deterred: they keep on 
heading for the woods, though to our eyes,
it’s only scrawny pines on either side.

I used to turn away from darkness
toward the distant light, taught myself 
to love the pearl-grey storm clouds, heavy 
on the horizon, the ones with brightness
breaking through. But year by year, darkness 
blotted out the sun, threatened to send 
the planet spinning sideways, a runaway 
tire on the freeway, tangle of tumbleweed 
targeting my windshield in high wind. 
Eventually, space junk will hurtle to the Earth, 
microbes or faulty genes catch up to all 
of us, this world incinerate to a dark 
cinder. But for now, I’ll take your hand 
and won’t let go, even though you want 
me to. We’ll stand together under a sea 
of phosphorescent stars that died a million 
years ago, and let that be enough.