I was sure it had been years
since anything near the creek
would care to swim in there.
Then that thin ghost waded by,
sharp-beaked, tall, with darting eyes
alert for food, muck-disguised,
muddling through the dark slow ooze.
The bird saw what I couldn’t though.
I suppose I see what I choose.
Certainly not the large rat.
I’ve learned to ignore those
pests. I watched. Mortal combat
wasn’t what I’d expected today.
The air, crisp, almost tasty.
The lead-dull sky of the city.
The bird pounded its prey
against the rickrack, hurriedly
swallowed it. Both so gray–
like smoke, like vapor, like smog–
a breeze, then a gasp, then gone,
Like ashes of someone I loved
in an urn under my tired arm.
Something I carried too long.
Let this dust fly like that heron
over gray concrete and stone.
—
Paul Jones’ poems landed on the moon in February 2024. His books are Something Wonderful (2021) and Something Necessary (2024), both from Redhawk Press. Recent poems appear in Hudson Review, Salvation South, Southern Poetry Review, New Verse Review, and in Best American Erotic Poems (1800-Present). Jones was inducted into the NC State Computer Science Hall of Fame in 2021. smalljones.com
