Sailing to wage war on Troy, the Greeks watch the birds:
Those on the right are good omens; on the left, looming dangers.

Looking out the window this morning, shaving,
Thinking how your ashes were shared with others,
But not with me; cast at your favorite places, but
Not at mine.

Just as I start to scold my petulance,
A crow             keen-eyed messenger between worlds
Flies    fast and flat across my field of vision
Left to right

Greg Friedmann recently won two contests offered during this year’s National Poetry Month in April 2019. “When Ponds Froze in Virginia” was a co-winner in the Loudoun County Library System’s Rhyme-On contest, and “The Lone Merganser” won 1st prize in the Robert S. Sergeant Memorial category (Sandra Beasley, Judge) of the Poetry Society of Virginia’s Adult Poetry Contest. He and his wife have lived alongside a channel of the Potomac River in northern Virginia for the last 35 years, so he often writes on riparian themes.