Ducks, by Jasmine Snow

 

Ducks

by Jasmine Snow

The ducks do not care that we are here,

nor do the leaves trickling from the cacophony of trees.

That jay in the thicket keeps his distance; the squirrels will flow about 

like a current around a stone. 

Still, I see the offerings we have made:  

           walnuts on a fence post, 

           the refuge of bridges over rivulets, 

           a new railing where its ancestors have rotted away.

But what are these tributes for? 

Evidence that we happened, once? Evidence that we had been here?

 

What is a poem to a pond?

Love, I think.

 

We cannot help ourselves. 

We are a recycling kind. We like to fix what we break;  

we like to return things better than we found them. 

These ponds are proof that we cared enough to start early, tucked away 

in a cityscape, waiting for the winds to take its mists 

to fill all big and little bodies on this Earth. 

Even the algae, and the red lily pads, and the cottonwoods, and the willows. 

Even the spider, who may spin memory aesthetics on benchbacks. 

Even the ant, who may call this sign home. 

Even the ducks.