-This poem reflects on barn swallows gathering before migration, pausing together above the pasture after a summer in flight as the first north wind begins to move through the space they leave behind.
Along the fence beside the barn,
the swallows gather wing to wing,
their rust-red throats turned toward the field,
their blue backs taking morning light.
All summer they have skimmed the grass,
and stitched the air above the pond,
but now they pause between the posts,
as if the road had reached the sky.
One rises, then the whole line lifts,
a blue-black ribbon over hay,
they circle once above the roof,
then settle farther down the wire.
By dusk, the pasture loses light,
the barn grows black beneath the eaves,
and where the swallows crowded close,
the north wind moves along the wire.