For HoundDog
Now that I have been accepted into
my vulture family
all of our stink and rot somehow seems less important.
We have conferences. We talk about
the importance of proper maintenance.
We are the avian garbage collectors.
No one ever cares.
Typical.
Like human garbage collectors, we discuss routes.
Unlike human garbage collectors, we don't look aghast
at the worst of the garbage.
Those routes are kind of hard to get.
You have to work up to them. Have seniority.
No one ever cares.
They don't need to care. Well, they might care if we were
gone.
Some of those other species.
The kind who leave us all of this tasty food.
Not likely, though. We don't
trust them.
If they want us to
trust them
then why don't they
decorate those great perches with carrion?
Instead
they make all of those irritating sounds.
Tiresome.
We get on, we vultures.
Thanks for all this poetry, Miep and HoundDog. We appreciate
that.
In fact, we even found Miep and visited her the other day.
We wanted to say hi; we knew she missed us.
Last we heard from her, she's still not seeing any vultures as she bikes
around town
not a one.
We have other things to eat at the moment.
But we just wanted to stop by
and let her
and you too, HoundDog
let you both know that we cared. We sent the lower cadres
down unto the lower currents of airflow where it is most dangerous
because vultures must have hot air to fly, and when we leave it's generally because the air has become too cold. Down that low
you never know
you never know.
We heard from Miep
that she thought that a most amazing sight
all of those vultures, so suddenly, all around her
and so many so low
and then again gone.
We're happy that you recognize our art.
We're your friends now.
We're your vultures.