Pelicans

Button eyes. Orange beaks. Pelicans.

When they spy me they share significant looks.

A missionary says one. A belly swagger. They disapprove.

They adjust wire frame glasses.

At home pelicans have bamboo blinds,

Rice paper partitions, Gen Mai Cha.

They spend evenings in polite ontological discussion.

Away, sailcloth sewn into shoulder blades; carpet bags for carry out.

All afternoon, on updrafts, they sail kites in oval swoons,

Inserting themselves - medieval weavers - into the blue silk of the summer sky.

A tall man from wing tip to wing tip, skimming marsh grasses,

Silent as an order of cloistered nuns.