Birds on a Wire

                   Birds on a Wire 

                  (On hearing that most birdsongs are either
                   claiming territory
                   or calling for a mate.)           
 

            They perch on words spanning the space

            between the poles of our conversations

            and echo our familiar strains,

            our same old songs of long distance

            love and local loss, with their own

            two-toned tunes warbling of nothing

            but war then lamenting their loneliness.