Crows

So. Nine crows to this April field.

Eight grounded dark in a small depression,

the bluets out but the field not green.

Their beaks jutted to feed, the three

to the North are watched by a fourth: he's

on one leg, equally hungry and equally

black, his slack beak heavily open.

The strut of all eight is high, the pasture's

limp; a central three jaunt caucus'd

among the new bluets, talking crow

with no thought of eating. Eight

is on guard, his old beak violent:

he's sighted their ninth, stalled in

from the South, wings down, beak clamped

on bleeding. This much turns out all right:

he's known. And knows where fit carrion

lies, bleached on the road by April sun.

So. April. The crows in possession.