I left water-bowls for the birds
during the worst of a dry summer.
On full-moon nights,
the glittering bowls pulled
night-creeping animals into my yard
and sometimes onto the porches.
I often watched the bowls shimmer
with light. On the darkest nights,
stars floated in the bowls, tiny beacons.
It’s true, there’s something divine at work
when the night-hunters appear,
armadillos, raccoons, possums, mostly,
to slurp the silvery surface.
then slip back into the shadows.
Once I heard a fox screaming and screaming,
from pleasure or menace, I do not know.
I heard this through the open windows,
the noise pulling me
from a half-dream, my mother resurfacing
to lay a soft hand on my shoulder
star-dusting me, cloaking me
in a security I hadn’t felt in a while.
Looking out from the open window,
I saw other creatures fade into the night.
By morning, I filled the bowls again,
the ripples splashing new light.
—
Rebecca A. Spears, author of Brook the Divide (Unsolicited Press) and The Bright Obvious (Finishing Line Press), has her poems, essays, and reviews included in TriQuarterly, Calyx, Crazyhorse, Barrow Street, Verse Daily, Ars Medica, Field Notes, and other journals and anthologies. She has received awards from the Taos Writers Workshop, Vermont Studio Center, Porches Writing Retreat, and Dairy Hollow House. Brook the Divide was shortlisted for Best First Book of Poetry (Texas Institute of Letters).
