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Waiting
Who has
the patience
to watch
the stars
all night,
counting them,
waiting
for the end?
The stones.
American Kestrel
A lone kestrel perched
there, the color of
hollyhock and Queen
Anne’s lace, the color of
chicory and sweet
clover, of day lily,
sunset, rain. All wings
and tearing things. All
sadness in the sun,
waiting. The color
of patience, this one
for whom the waiting
is never done.
Tom Montag is most recently the author of In This Place: Selected Poems 1982-2013, as well as Middle Ground, Curlew: Home, Kissing Poetry’s Sister, The Idea of the Local, and The Big Book of Ben Zen. Recent poems will be found in Hummingbird, Stoneboat, and Digital Papercut. He blogs as The Middlewesterner and serves as the Managing Editor of the Lorine Niedecker Monograph Series.
Portage Magazine 
