Sanctuary

by Joan Mazza (September 2024)

Sanctuary
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I moved to this wooded property off the road,
vowed to make it a bird sanctuary. No cats allowed.
My dog lived and slept with me inside, trained
to stay close, not chase wood ducks, Canada geese,
or terrorize hummingbirds at the feeders. Years
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of cataloguing migrating birds like rose-breasted
grosbeaks and the date of the dark-eyed juncos’
arrival. I bought high-fat dog food and sprinkled
the wood railings outside my dining area to watch
the show: cardinals, blue jays, even crows
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if I were out of sight. Fifty-six species of birds
I could identify, counting five of woodpeckers.
Uncounted warblers and little brown birds
too quick for me to photograph. And then one
cat sniffed out the food and leaped to the railing
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to feast. That one I named Quatrain, and they’ve
been coming since, invite their friends and littermates.
Sestina and Haiku lived inside where they couldn’t
kill. But more arrived: Sonnet, Pantoum, and now
Limerick, most feral of the three. They know when
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meals are served. No hummingbird feeders allowed.
Blue jays too smart to come this way. Still a sanctuary,
my back porch is reconfigured with insulated
cat houses for winter, safe from coyotes. Cats drink
from the birdbath. The birds have gone elsewhere.
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The Last Daydreamers
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We are the last of our kind, born long before
the World Wide Web and Google, having lived
with books, pages redolent of ink and glue.
We remember playing in open lots in cities,
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exploring the remnants of nurseries where
we salvaged clay pots, built small fires.
Untethered by phones, we could be lost, no
contact with parents for most daylight hours
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unless the school called to say we were sick.
We still remember gazing out windows, lying
on a sun-warmed rock near the river, listening
to the water, birdsong, watching clouds, no
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device to answer every question of fact,
no music or podcasts, no constant ping and ding
of twitter, text, and messaging. We knew where
we were. What mischief might our curiosity
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inspire? Our minds free, in solitude and silence,
we could travel anywhere. We turned over rocks
to find worms and salamanders, crouched
upwind to watch squirrels, uninterrupted.
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I sit in silence on my back porch, listen
for spring peepers, Canada geese, transcribe crow
conversation between the wide-ruled lines.
Never bored, my mind still knows how to zoom in.
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Financial Advisor
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My first was my mother, who doled out
twenty cents a week, for milk at school
with the lunch she made every day.
Four cents for a small carton, money
I had to manage through the week, not
spend on forbidden candy or gum.
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Mother sent me to the store with a list
for sales, told me to check my change,
check that I wasn’t overcharged, check
that I didn’t leave anything behind.
She told me to save to get married.
So many things I’d need to start a home,
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with my own kitchen, new furniture, beds,
linens. Save for a rainy day, save for a down
payment on a house. Buy a two-family
house and let the tenant pay the mortgage.
Save for vacations. Don’t buy anything
“on time” or on layaway. Don’t incur
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debt or obligations. Don’t be wasteful
with food or paper. Take care of what
you have. Look behind you before you
leave a train or bus or restaurant, make
sure, you haven’t left behind a sweater
or bag or package you just paid for.
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Plan for a secure future. Everything’s
expensive, especially children, taxes,
electricity, telephone, car. Make sure
you budget, careful you don’t wind up
in poverty, begging and homeless
on the street. You can’t come back here.
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