Frostwriting

Florida

by M. A. Schaffner

1.  The Homeland

Along the line of trees the jays and hawks
expel metallic cries.  Songbirds flutter,
beating the leaves for smaller fare.  At times
a Pileated Woodpecker explodes
into a note of Archaeopteryx.
These are the basics.  The pig pen, junked cars,
chicken coops, and manufactured homes
on sandy alleys leading to hard roads
are grace notes grown too loud, off-key, and long.
Not evil and uncaring – only us, and what
we need for building nests and marking out
a small space to bellow our lonely songs,
display what plumage we possess, and pass
as much as what we can learn to what we love.

2.  The Threat

Every year since then we pounded the nails
deeper into our cross, soaked rags with gas
and bound them round with barbed wire – got matches,
lit smokes nonchalantly while discussing
post hole diggers and pulleys.  Now we raise
our pride like a defiant flag, only
burning like they would if we could fix them
in the lynching eye of a hunting drone.

That’s what you get when you mess around here –
vengeful rednecks who can fix anything
or break it, and don’t really think causes,
only blood and wrathful justice.  Like those
with no more sense than to blow themselves up
sober, if you can believe that crazy shit.