Sweeping the Deck this Morning

Sweeping the deck just now, 

I wonder if the broom's whoosh 

breaks our rule of morning silence.

Ever since you told us she was 

gone, an urge to make nests 

overcame me. Today, here in 

the Carolina woods, a kind of nest 

is making itself. First come two 

empty branches mimicking antelope 

horn. Then a wood mushroom

sprung from the split grain in a flat 

spruce bench, three tough lobes 

rimmed in palest sienna. Finally,

the corpus of a moth, one hook-tipped 

wing tucked over the other in 

quelled catlike ferocity. This all comes 

about as I skim away gum tree ribs 

dotting the hickory slats outside the kitchen 

like song notes. Momentarily at odds 

with my next move, I annex the last 

puckered leaves to compost, and some 

dirt to a sorrel patch at the edge, where 

doubtless some of it had come from

to begin with. Later, I'm finally able 

to mourn a future spiraling out 

from the girl who stood before us 

the first day we met, her gaze an amber 

catlike ferocity, her unsung anthem 

humming its earliest note in every bite 

of holiday sweet, every sip of tea.

—Peregrine Journal (Amherst Writers & Artists), April 2026