Moriah LaChapell’s most recent poem to appear here was “Love’s Succession” (April 2013) 

Shorebirds
By Moriah LaChapell

My father taught me the language of birds.
the signals in primal movement and sound.
The significance of wings and trills transferred
through trees, across water.

Tonight after we spoke,
I watched loons float across water
as a boat carrying tourists passed.
Leaving waves we’d find traumatic.
They bob with the wake
as if the disturbance has occurred
for a thousand years.

He said Phalaropes
take care of their young
while the female hunts.

So when he was left alone
he remembered the male nestled
with his young at night
in the wake of changing water.

We moved as our world transformed
floating on the surface
with broken grace.

There will never be perfect stillness
as we skim across the surface
to find shelter on rocky shores.