Pre-dawn darkness
lights my mind with
the view through my kitchen window.

The seasonal creek
white-capped for weeks
last winter, after the rains charged
our parched patch of earth.

Cooper’s hawk shrieks betwixt
oak branches.
schooling her
fledglings of the hunt

An owl, white,
“who” speaks each night
of mice and rabbits.

Precocious woodpeckers
perforate my wood siding
hiding ranched worms
In carefully examined acorns

And the birds of all colors that flock
to eat green toyon berries
leave plenty for me for
jam next Christmas.

Dawn, before the dogs awake,
timid deer investigate
my Machu Picchu,

while squirrels emerge from
dry rotting logs –
enough to burn fifty winters.