A Petal In Arkansas

by Barbara Siegel Carlson

My first petal of the season.
What a feeling
to touch it with my lip 

as I pause on the pavement by a porch
where red, blue & yellow birds
made of wood sit inside
an old-fashioned bird cage. 

True they can’t sing, and one 
of the bluebirds dangling 
from a fishing line
itself dangles a spider thread,

and that broken thread
appears to be conducting
the twitter of a brown leaf
in the rusted birdbath
where the cage is perched.

How many worlds 
breathe behind the curtains,
the screens, the bars of other cages, 
in cells & under eyelids, humming 
as someone awakens 
and another dies.

What else, who else is conducting
but part of the ceremony
where everyone plays a most humble 
and decisive note?

Someone is lifting the shade.
A white cat at a window.
A lustrous breeze brings 
more petals down.