Robin

a childhood memory of an evening song,
caroling Peterson called it,
he knew of such things

and the sublime shape
all proportion and balance,
slaty perfection and terracotta,
brick-red in the mountain ash
with its freeze-dried berries,
a heady fruit for the good flocks
that come to gorge and pose

how they work the lawns
in the spring with that tilting eye
and still circumspection
then the hurried march - repeating
stabbing the earth and rearing back,
pulling a worm much too big
for its gape, a cartoon extravaganza

so close to us, just look out the window
you can see them everywhere when
the weather chimes a new beginning,
a comfort to us when lost and uncertain,
robins singing the praises of their short lives
when the world forgets such things