Already

Already squirrels courting on
the maple’s bare branches
chasing, tumbling, wild
and determined
as teenage boys

while my old hen sings softly
the ancient song of her kind
approaching again the
nest box long empty

which I cushion now with
clean straw, feeling her feel
the eggs soon to come, how already
they speak to the lengthening light

feeling her feel as if I were
no longer a pale creature
of paper calendars
but an animal, too,
alive to the quickening world

my blood already rising with
theirs toward the sun
as the tides answer
the moon

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Tags: animals, chickens, hens, instinct, nature, poem, poetry, seasons, spirituality, spring, squirrels, wildlife, winter