Peter Makuck: Two Poems
Found
Out my study window
bare branches
and a brown lawn,
a consideration of how
I spend my light,
day after same
blank day,
how it’s not much better
until that lawn goes
orange at sunset
and tonight I expect
nothing from the salt swamp
at the boardwalk’s end
but the air
has a good tang of low tide
when I turn on
my light. The beam
catches a raccoon
out on the flats,
digging, looking,
for something to eat.
My light
sends him on a run
to the cattails.
Now half-hidden
his eyes glare,
eyes that remind me
I’ve been looking
all day
for something
found at last.
.
At The Retention Pond
Our bickering stops
when behind us
distant hooting
becomes a V of geese
losing its shape
as it quickly descends,
skidding into the water
and scattering. Slowly
they reassemble
and paddle into the cattails.
We stand
and watch until
they disappear into
the evening shadows when
even the water
regains its composure
becoming glass again
a mirror for treetops
and orange clouds.
You take my hand.
We begin to walk again
without words,
you humming a tune
we both like.
Copyright 2021 Peter Makuck
Peter Makuck‘s many books include Mandatory Evacuation (BOA 2016). He lives with his wife Phyllis on Bogue Banks, one of North Carolina’s barrier islands.
Water regains its composure. – I like that, also “walking without words”
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