a green front yard
full of doves grazing
pecking at insects here
and there amid shining grass.
Not like a flock of gulls at the beach
flatfooted on sand
or a flotilla of geese
launching onto a lake but like
a flock of sheep or a herd of cows chewing cud.
They seemed so at home
so domestic. If each dove
were tethered
by a thin lead to a fence post
if I had seen
a small shepherdess tend them
with her crook
I could not have been more surprised.
