A poem for the pandemic

Caregiver’s Song

When voices like children

hear themselves in a trickling creek,

I laugh at the wisdom

of their foolishness—

and everything becomes still,

the sun gone down, the moon falling as dew,

my eyes gone black waiting

for my counting off till morning.

Come home, children, home free

before you are caught outside

by dark birds flying their hunger.

The creek sings in children

who laugh again and shout for haven

in the hills that laugh all echoes back.

And I may sleep some night at last,

counting off cold stars past morning.

published in the Hurricane Review

David Anthony Sam