GOOD NEWS

As we stood window-framed and silent,

staring at bareness come round again,

the lame doe we thought dead, unseen

since spring, came limping winter gray,

slowing as she took the slick bank

in the neighbors’ yard, hooves clicking

onto icy asphalt, tentative at the edge

of the woods, gauging, no doubt, the jump

before she lunged forward, her tail

flagging good news as it ebbed away.

Roger Pfingston has poems in recent issues of Innisfree Poetry Journal, Rhino, Spoon River Poetry Review, and U.S. 1 Worksheets. His latest chapbook is A Day Marked for Telling from Finishing Line Press.