Kalima Hamilton wrote this beautiful poem. She is the author of Outside the Lava Fields (Aldrich Press 2012). Her poetry has appeared or is forthcoming at Prairie Schooner, Hawai’i Pacific Review, and Shenandoah.
Drawn Back by Oranges
By Kalima Hamilton
Late March and the faithful swallows return
to San Juan Capistrano;
to San Juan Capistrano;
in ones and twos they flock
around the feet of the Fathers,
some indelible code impelling
them back,
back to the mission with its Spanish archways,
the beautiful fountains.
It’s about knowing who feeds you,
pecking at sunflower seeds &
feeling
the warm orange-thick California air–
you return again & again
(a ritual of clockwork),
to bougainvillea draping the adobe,
this iced pink promise
of Mexican primrose pushing up
through cracks in the sunlit sidewalk.
Exquisite!
Lovely description.