GRACKLES
Emptied
by summer, the parking lot
Shimmered
like silver, scoured by rain,
Flared
to gray fire under the early sun.
I
saw grackles wading in disdain
Of
the wet ground, pecking the grass
That
grew in a fringe. The fronds
Waved
above water in the morning wind,
Speckling
with dew the rain-fed ponds.
Drawn
by the nightly rain, snails crawled,
Salting
the dark pavement with ghostly white.
The
grackles watched sideways with fly-green eyes,
Then
snapped at their shells with delight.
I
left the grackles sporting there,
Playing,
the free lords of the day.
I
sighed, bent down, took up my books,
And,
slavelike, heavy, went my way.
Notes
Why grackles? I think mainly because I liked saying 'grackle.' It seems I had only recently discovered the technical name of these 'black birds,' and their ubiquity and commonness put them on a par with sparrows as symbols of the everyday struggle to survive. I was waiting for a shuttlebus at the college parking lot, a rather dreary and interminable process.
