Random word generated poem

The poem is inspired by the words and the unsettling news that bird flu is now going through wild populations, something it has never done before. It’s endemic to many bird species, but rarely causes a problem except to captive birds in unnaturally close promiscuity. This is different and as yet, there is no explanation.

Photo ©Jeremy Bolwell

Influenza gathers in her flock

Black sand, sky specks,
birds billow in flowing sea-movement,
wandering the wild open spaces,
stitching the roof of the world.

Nothing can stop the diminishing,
not the warm winter sun,
the days growing longer,
the bird-comfort of semblables.

Something has broken in the cycle,
we have broken something in the cycle,
the stitching comes undone,
and one by one they fall

until all the sky is swept clean
of black sand,
of songs and twittering,
of feathered beauty.

We will point
to the whitening bones
and blame bad luck, cruel nature,
and in our waking sleep

wash the bird spots
from our wringing hands
in the multitudinous skies,
making the green world black.