"Redwoods Avenue of Giants" by sobolevnrm is licensed under CC BY-SA 2.0
Read-breasted robins gather on the softball field
in the heavy fog, searching for bugs.
As I approach they take to the sky in one
smooth, silent trajectory. It is clear,
even when humans are not using this land,
these birds think of it as ours.
I do not want it to be mine.
I want the green expanse, a kind of
banquet of insects, to be theirs; I want them
to tell me when I am intruding; I want them
to chase me off for showing up at
family dinner like some traveling salesman
ringing their doorbell. I think of Sonoma, of the
wild green woods, the shrubs and grasses
so massive in the summer, humming with
birds and crawling things. There, nature
is so pervasive and huge that you know,
without doubt, one day it will take over,
swallow everything, and claim its due.