Branched like an artery,
the dying oak leafs out
with February robins.
This is their layover month,

down to the Keys and back.
True snowbirds!
A man with a .45 and a measured eye
could pick them off one by one,

or just sketch them—but why bother?
Imagination is enough,
like that bed you might
have shared with someone else.

They’re chaste, chasing each other—
one wing in the future, one in the past.