trumpeter swans swaddling
wetlands this time of year
annual migration to Vancouver
ancient sky mariners
seeking old haunts
the runners and bicyclists
slow for egrets
necks hunched in
Canada geese moving slightly
beaver pair paddling under
cutbank
election pamphleteering
nailed to roadsides
dour faces one and all
white, plague of locusts
from evangelical eyes
hip replacements
exercise equipment
positioned toward
FOX, CNN, make-up
lights illuminating dreaded
ignorance, no concept
of migratory Canada geese
giant blue herons
why some stay
maybe there on Salmon
Creek, Vancouver, Washington
awaiting two dozen swans
maybe resident
aliens fooled
by warm winds
sun where fog shrouded
maybe the mergansers
are enough entertainment
for flickers, even rare Fall
hummers dance along shafts
of light cutting through
molting maples
just maybe trumpeters
lift off dredged
cultivated wetlands
as a reminder of what
more will be lost
as the hosts drive away
in SUVs and Subarus
still stinging from
their little world
of preening cock of the walk
candidates saying nothing
in their entire lives what
a swan can say with one honk