Joyful Ruins

Montana taught me

not just to

admire the birds

and their songs

but know them each

by their names

and colors

A duck

no longer

just a duck

but the miraculous

Mergansers

and Mallards

a bird not just

a bird

but Flickers and

Waxwings

Montana taught me awe

to watch

the small acts of nature

and pause in wonder

the colors of

grasshoppers

in the summer

the songs of Chorus Frogs

in the Spring

the golden leaves

of cottonwoods

in Fall

the freezing of the

great Yellowstone River

in Winter

and the breaking sounds of ice

as it thaws

I’ll never see

the natural world

the same way

And that is what

Montana taught me