Blackbirds at Dawn

In an apartment in St. Paul,

a man stands in the window,

looking east. Red rays

and dawn’s rosey fingers

spread across a sky

whose message is nothing

…but possibility.

*

Black birds swirl in unison

as if the undulating air

were two lovers on which

they rode; up and down,

on and off… One can only see

the pure joy of instinct

as the birds obey an unseen

force—the one

that makes even God blush.

*

That man soothes his heart

in the knowledge the blackbirds

confer. Their story signals

something we cannot know.

There isn’t an idea that can

cause that experience; only

the inexplicable joy of the divine

instinct when the right man

and the right woman join.

*

Presence is everything.

Longing is something.

Absence, a sin to endure.

And here he is, standing alone.

The sun rises and says all these

things, yet he stands alone.

He thanks the sun. He thanks

the blackbirds. He dreams

of her with the saddest

joy-filled heart on Earth.

-Anthony Signorelli