haunted by cries on a November afternoon.
The geese, with their compass needle necks,
their tumultuous hurry

are passing, have been passing
for days. Each with a piece of magnetic field
planted deep behind its sun-fired eye

heading south. Jostled by wind, pelted
by rain. Unlikely, unlikely
their cacophonous holler, their harpy wail.

Something of us goes with them,
feels the ebb in the blood tides
and salt marshes, the emptiness, the cold.