Unrolling <br />the coiled scroll <br />enacts the momentary <br />sweeping down the midday sky <br />of small birds <br />on a draft from the distant <br />blue ravines <br />and mountain ridges <br />into the windy clearing <br />of summer's <br />middle distance, so luminous <br />and near <br />it's easy to ignore <br />given the distraction <br />of hollyhocks <br />and the stalks of amber iris <br />that steeply <br />lean into the emptiness <br />that borders <br />the tended garden path <br />Any fear of what imperils <br />and impends <br />is thereby tempered— <br />the tidal and jagged line <br />of the far mountains <br />merely an artful <br />mapping of the birds' <br />arc of flight <br />And such a glimmer of gaiety <br />as they dip and swoop <br />with unguarded ease <br />into the inseparable <br />immensity <br />my heart stops now <br />as I think of it<br /><br />Margaret Gibson<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/summer-birds-and-flowers/
