The Widower

by L. Lynn Young

I call it "Sir," the dove that perches on my children's playset
He and his missus would coo and rub
beaks and
crap all over the swing below
But I never shooed them away
Something about those two just got to me
Perhaps it was the way they sang love songs to one another
and fluffed up against the winter winds, their breasts full
Wings touching, eyes adoring
As if they were the only two birds in the yard

Four years of winters and springtimes and Windexing the swing
Come summer
Endeared me, calmed me as I sat on the porch, away from the alternate madness and thick silences that cling to the walls
of my home like nicotine
Here, I thought many times as I watched them flirt and flutter wildly,
is true romance

Sir sits on the playset, alone
And I sit on the porch, as usual
The both of us, I'm sure, delighted with the sun, the daffodils
Sir doesn't appear to be lonely, just relieved to be free of his winter coat
He must think of her, though, even if it's only a fleeting whisper of her song, a tickle against his wing
I roll up my sleeves, enjoy the burn on my forearms, grateful
for the bees, the lone tulip swaying in the breeze like a beckoning finger
And I begin to sing

Copyright 2003 by L. Lynn Young

L. Lynn Young's short stories and poems have appeared in a wide variety of small press publications, both print and web. Recent work can be found in the Cemetery Poets: Grave Offerings anthology (Double Dragon Publishing), available in e-book and hardcover.
Look out for SCARLET’S DOLLY, forthcoming in the Wicked Little Girls anthology (Allegra Press), JESUS, MARY AND MR. PYLE in Scared Naked Magazine (June ‘03), and WOMB FULL OF POPPIES, appearing soon in NFG magazine.