Four Poems by Al Ortolani

Eagles on Live Cam

My wife is watching an eagle camera
set above an Ozark aerie. The eaglets
are pecking escape from their shells.
They are ponderously slow, but my wife
watches the breaking
as if she can help the young crack free.
It’s the mother in her, identifying
with the helpless, as if enabling
them to emerge as downy tufts, hatchlings
in a decades old nest of driftwood weave,
two puffs of hunger in light snow.
An empty nest to her is the echo
in the kitchen, chairs shoved in,
children flown from the breakfast table.

*

Bird Feeders in the Next Life

Only the squirrels visit the handfuls
of birdseed I’ve broadcast across
the top of the snow. I break down

an Amazon box and smooth it flat
under the dogwood tree, one of the few
spots where the snow is shallow.

I pour a small mountain of seed
at the tip of the Amazon arrow. Only
the dog visits, sniffs the cardboard,

the scent of sunflower. For Christmas
my wife gave me a smart feeder, one
that when put together correctly and linked

to the internet, keeps surveillance on
the birds. Currently, it’s still in its box
and pushed under my desk. Buddhists

say that we continue to return to the world
like cicadas, until the suffering of all
sentient beings has been sung to its end.

I have time to link up the new feeder,
before it’s too late. The snow
turning to ice, the entire lawn concrete

to birds, their small chisel beaks
as hapless as best intentions. I have
become a hero to squirrels. They
dedicate their largest acorn to me.

*

Oyster Dressing

Boxes and ribbons still litter the living room
although we have scooted them into piles,
some for saving, some for the dumpster.

Now that Christmas is over and the family
has returned to their homes across the city
I retreat to my little office at the back of the house,

the dog curled on the one-man bed snoring.
It’s a quiet morning, except for the neighbor
trying out his new leaf blower. We could

have opened a bottle of red wine in front
of the fireplace, talked about the children
and the grandchildren they in turn are raising.

We might have wondered about our parents
and grandparents, the oyster dressing, the apple pies.
The recipes we thought we’d remember.

My wife opens the bifold doors to dump
a load of laundry into the washer. It is
the sound we share when moving on.

*

Harley Davidson

Even after his death, my father needed
to visit his children. It was a given
that he’d show up at unexpected moments

as a cardinal at the window, pecking on the glass,
moving around the house from pane to pane
or filling the backyard tree in a hooded red flock.

We’d come to expect him, to relish whatever
message he presumed to send. My niece dreamed
he rode a motorcycle, a Harley Davidson
into her sleep, which was odd, and humorous

since he’d been a fan of knock-off Vespas,
the cheaper the better. To comfort her grandmother,
she told the story of the dream, the scooter

turned muscle bike. Her grandmother paled,
and handed over a Harley Davidson key she’d found
in Dad’s coat pocket. There were explanations,

but no secret Harley tucked away under tarps
in the garage. My niece kept her story private,
the key in her jewelry box. Years later,

Dad rode again into her brother’s dream
on the same motorcycle after his dog passed,
the dog on his grandfather’s lap, tail wagging,

tongue lolling like it did for treats. My nephew,
an emergency room doctor, a man of heart monitors,
the science of code blue defibrillator paddles.

*

Al Ortolani is a winner of the Rattle Chapbook Prize and has been featured in Garrison Keillor’s Writer’s Almanac, Ted Kooser’s American Life in Poetry, and George Bilgere’s Poetry Town. He was the recipient of the Bill Hickok Humor Award from I-70 Review. Currently, he’s a contributing poetry editor to the Chiron Review.