This expanse of watery green
will deceive by
throwing off eagles
and egrets at random.
On these banks where a
city is built upon
common ground the
wind can bring strangers in.
This is where
even an ivory gull
can meet its fate.
The oceans reek of plastic
when Easter Island is foretold
by the lines a seer reads.
The heat lingers on
from dusk to dawn.
And ballast water brings
the foreign to spawn in
the freshwater ocean
of my home.
They are a marvel to
watch, these gems of
black and orange, brushing
the Rudbeckia with just a
slip and then on and on
to the other plants in the
garden I tend. I watch them,
and truly this is orange,
undyed and beckoning.
Yes, we are likely your bane
and yes, the milkweed sprouts
everywhere around me
and is left to stand.
Perhaps it helps, perhaps
it is too late. But while the
sun is beckoning me out the door
and when the wind brushes
my shoulder with a shiver
I will stop and listen
to every living thing.
Dancing monarch of the orange
this color is yours.
Anne's mediocre poetry 