It was the year I woke late, missed mornings
out the kitchen window, missed the trail of fog, 
missed the osprey, the shreds of air in his hunting wake.
But I caught the cold-water mornings of stove and sink, 
days of turning around.

It was the year I promised to never regret 
laundry on the basement floor, lamplight
up late, starlings in the attic, the voles,
the relentless call of night frogs.

It was a year of flood and fire. I knew
the bay had saved us, but it was too dark to see.
I accused the moon—full, gibbous, quarter, dark
or turning, but never enough. A fox drowned. 
Trees exploded. Vultures spread their wings to dry.

It was a year of smoke-filled corners as rain ran up the hills. 
I might say "He did this, he did that, he forgot my name
in the night." But his heart bloomed every morning and 
I missed that. He couldn't hear the bats, but he knew all their names. 
Fields of wild radish understood better than I. 

This morning, a breath of white through the window. 
Broken bird calls. Someone's kindness alight in the trees.
Day unwinds in the open box—a ballerina turning 
in her pinked room, dance of the incomplete song. 
And one bird tells his story of the grocery cart 
with the squeaky wheel calling up the aisles.