NATURE WALK

A thousand wild birds were shrieking

in the hedge as if they’d just heard

the news of the world. Yet a stranger

passing by said it wasn’t really news,

just the past replayed on a banana peel,

a needle stuck in a groove.

And he must have seen me sway,

with my starched and privileged dreams.

“You can only sing along so long,” he said.

“After that, you have to scream.”

Peter Serchuk is author of the collections All That Remains and Waiting for Poppa at the Smithtown Diner.  His poetry has appeared widely in literary journals, including Paris Review, Epoch, Southwest Review, Hudson Review, Boulevard, Missouri Review, American Poetry Review, and Poetry.