Rumbling: (v.) the sense of discomfort when that particular sight is migratory, fleeting

The rumbling is the rumbling
Of the shadow of the Gods
Like piano-playing shaped leaves
Or the pitter-patter of rain
That graces the palmetto forest.

It is 4:35pm in Key West
The last passerine, magenta or indigo,
Streaks across the flagrant ocean sky
And cuts slits right through
The afternoon mint-flavored High Tea.

Passerine: (n.) a migratory bird that braves the skies, flies overnight, a few-time immigrant

The dwarf pines are a diaspora in the scrub,
Neither here nor there,
They are a philosophy all alone
A Mount Olympus in the sweltering heat
To the billions of nearly-visible particles
That could ebb dirt or sand fleas.

The rumbling is the rumbling
Of the last passerine
Shot out of the shadow of the Gods
While the overside of trees wait
And see what only once
The sea-foam of the littoral
Could muster up the brazenness to see.

Jonathan Perez is a part-time published poet. He has won The Bowdoin Poetry Prize and the Nathalie Walker Lleweyn Prize for Poetry. He has published poems in Prelude and Junto Magazine and The Write Launch as well as poem of the week in Silver Needle Press. He is working on an unpublished Chapbook Passerines of Dusk. He is an avid birdwatcher, and amateur ornithologist in Central Park and urban landscapes. His career is as a criminal prosecutor. He hopes to do for poetry what Audubon has done for visual art for birding. Jonathan is a selected poet at Cave Canem for the fall of 2018. His email is jonathanaperez@gmail.com.