DAVE LUCAS

Still Life

Already the birds,
black and heavy, have congregated
above me, holding parliament
on the highest of the slack wires
outside my apartment.
I imagine them
squawking avian politics at each other,

like old men at Denny’s
after church, sipping
their black coffee,
flapping their wrinkles
over the new taxes, Earl’s cancer,
the Browns, not worth a damn.
All the talk flusters
their feathery hair.

And just before sunset
these early winter afternoons,
I come home and see
through the window
the familiar couple, well on
in years, spooning soup
into their slack mouths.
Between them a portrait of
a Byzantine Christ,
blessing everything in sight.