The Guard

Thomas Quitzau

June 4, 2022

Short wide shadow glides across close-cut grass:

The ospreys are here.

I’m not sure what triggers the smaller birds,

Slow ominous projections? Or maybe

It’s the automatic firing of its

Fierce call piercing the thick green canopy:

Roughly 19 shots all in succession.

The circling raptors live somewhere near here

But not here here, in this patch of trees.

You can tell by the way the little birds

Freeze—most are still, eerily, some skitter.

And then, invariably emerges

One—shockingly direct—almost as if

She was waiting, as if she were trained to

Strike—darting straight to strike his tail feathers,

Her shot across the dangerous stranger’s

Bottom followed by gutsy yells (part of 

Her tough training), her martial artist “HA!”

Barely moved and seemingly unperturbed,

The black-and-white hector moves on to search

For unprepared groves, those perhaps lacking

Even a single paladin waiting

To stand up for those who have only just 

Learned to fly.

Thomas Quitzau is a poet and teacher who grew up in the Gulf Coast region and who worked for over 30 years in Houston, Texas. A survivor of Hurricane Harvey, he recently wrote a book entitled Reality Showers, and currently teaches and lives on Long Island, New York with his wife and children.