The Killdeer’s Cry

My neighbor’s empty lot,
grown over with
wild grasses, dandelions, clover,
was a draw for butterflies
bees, for unseen creatures
until the mowers came.
After they left, I saw her,
frantically skittering in circles
where her nest must have been.
I watched, listened
to her keening as she searched.
Her voice pierced my heart,
for I recognized her sorrow.
She was mourning chicks
lost with the nest.
As a mother who has
also lost a child, I joined my
tears to her cries.

*

Joan Leotta plays with words on page and stage. She performs tales of food, family, strong women. Internationally published as an essayist, poet, short story writer, and novelist, she’s a 2021 and 2022 Pushcart nominee, Best of the Net 2022 nominee, and 2022 runner-up in Robert Frost Competition. Her essays, poems, and fiction appear in Ekphrastic Review, Verse Visual, Verse Virtual, anti-heroin chic, Gargoyle, Active Muse, Silver Birch, Yellow Mama, Mystery Tribune, Ovunquesiamo, MacQueen’s Quinterly and others. Her poetry chapbooks are Languid Lusciousness with Lemon and Feathers on Stone.