It's Still Life

Cuckoo

It’s been decades since I heard
a cuckoo’s voice here,
here in this pine grove with
trees long as telegraph poles.

Can you smell that?

It’s the scent of pine pitch,
it awakens my childhood.
Those summers were so hot,
pine needles crunching underfoot.

I believed fairytales were born here.

Once upon a time.
All stories start that way.
All except for poems.
Poems don’t come from here.

There’s no form or repetition here.

Maybe the cuckoos migrated
to a forest where trees aren’t
chopped down every December.

But as I said,
It’s been decades since I heard one.

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