Robins Embody the Holly

From crotched, zealous
emerald shields

comes this pealing, vernal throstle,
off-season in barbed hotel,

a chromic quire. Much is lost
on me, but loss is not.

Night’s tumbler, verdigris,
drops fast on day’s debris.

I swallow.
No surrogate for divinity, I know,

yet an earful of spring wine reams
grief: not mere mimicry. Not mine.