A Skein of Geese

pierces the canvas of the horizon.
Their cries punch through, audible
before they are visible, stem-stitching the sky.

Watching them, you and I are a small knot
puckering the surface of the lake,
emerald filaments raveling from the root.

Once, I rowed your boat to the other shore.
We ate and grew fat, grazing
on duckweed at the water’s edge.

All this before our wings grew in, before
you wound your way south,
before I learned how to bind

my heart in wool and sharpen it
to a point, steel-beaked, split-feathered,
ready to scent the wind.

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