…all you need is the will

to sit silent and still

on your back porch rocker

until,

as though by magic,

a crow,

scout for his murder,

shows up on the weedy edge

of the pond in your meadow.

Cautious,

he hops to the shallow puddles on the shore line there,

bare of high grass and soggy, fallen leaves,

picks his little spot and takes his bath.

Splashing around, waving his wings, dunking his head,

flapping about, extatic in his private wash tub,

brazen as he pleases,

relishing his secluded hygiene.

Finished,

he, dripping,

flits to a lower branch of an old live oak,

hides in sun-dappled shade.

He perches there, damp feathers drying

to glistening ebony in the sun.

His boudoir business done,

he searches the sky to spy on that Sharp Shinned Hawk

who had commandeered the pond and meadow

as his private hunting ground

but seems to have abandoned it

for lack of victims on which to prey and feed,

they all having fled his danger,

but you never know…

Then that brave solitary crow

cackles and caws to friendly gangs of his brothers

his own wild version of that human children’s taunt,

“Na! Na!Na! NA! NA!”

informing his pals of his successful return

to their old neighborhoods public baths,

inviting them to,

“Come! Take the waters!

Enjoy our communal pools!

Before that damn, sanguine hawk tries

to make a meal of us, once again!”

Yes!

All you need to keep balanced

between your despair and your hope,

(weighing not too much of either)

is a daily dose of danger and hate,

found there in the tranquil pond,

gentle in the meadow.

Where you have been willing

to simply perch and watch and wait and participate

in what you know is always there,

both the bath and the hawk.