Cruel Spring

My child calls to tell me a horror story,
a scene she’s just witnessed in her backyard
beneath the Bradford pear where, last week
her dog found a nest of newborn rabbits.
Before she could stop it, the pug
snatched one tiny life and shook it dead.
But that was already a week’s old tale.

Today’s story involves a crow. She saw it
fling a small thing into the air, then poke it
with its beak where it landed. Then it took off
with the thing in its talons. The mother rabbit
was left there under the tree, hopping around
in despair and disbelief. My daughter had
to tell me this.

Oh, bunny my bunny! Sometimes
I can hardly bear my own good fortune.

*

Tamara Madison is the author of three full-length volumes of poetry, “Wild Domestic”, “Moraine” (both from Pearl Editions) and “Morpheus Dips His Oar” (Sheila-Na-Gig Editions), and two chapbooks, “The Belly Remembers” (Pearl Editions) and “Along the Fault Line” (Picture Show Press). Her work has appeared in Chiron Review, Your Daily Poem, the Writer’s Almanac, Sheila-Na-Gig, Worcester Review, ONE ART, and many other publications. More about Tamara can be found at tamaramadisonpoetry.com.