Decoys

Their silence is the poetry

of surfaces, a buoyancy

poised at the waterline of pure

appearance. Nothing's hidden here:

the sleek heads nod in calm assent

to every ripple, their element

a glassy equilibrium

in which they neither sink nor swim.

The sky they know ends in the reeds,

all of its mirrored wings and clouds

beneath their level, wooden stare.

Unruffled in any weather,

they balance is with seem, their gift

for image catching this world's drift.