Autumn is a devious time when death 
comes with splendor, and summer dreams once warm 
enticements become crows on the roof:  

guttural jabberers,
hoarders of barbed nettles, 
hard seeds, bits of asphalt 
swallowed to digest carrion.

Heads, eyes, beaks, wings, 
bob, stare, cock, twitch.  

Crows die in thick winter. Death starts with a sluggish 
beak. I won’t elaborate. But in autumn, still... 				  


A monarch, black and butter,
wings fledged in amazon rain 
bursts, strays alone searching for 
its kin like one word wanting another.

On the roof, a keen, craven eye sees a tremor of beauty 
in gray wind-napped milkwood and flies with a beak still agile.