Bitter Night in the Country

Requisite dog bark. Far off.
No response.

Unless the sound of someone
hammering a plank into place counts as dialogue.

Late night fence-mending
or a crime of passion, could go either way.

But for now it’s dogs and chores
and breath in clouds,

and geese grieving overhead,
a lost tribe beating their wings

through unpunctuated blackness.
Crying exhaustion, hunger, fear,

they circle slowly to touch down
on the lightless earth they’ve longed for

where they’ll settle in the meadow
and contentedly foul it for us all.