abiotic and biotic factors at lake lansing in winter
a few parked cars and people wandering on lunch break // bird with white streaks on blue wings
brown squirrel with orange tufts in the snow // what are the biotic and abiotic factors
frenetic unfocused energy I feel guilty about // touch me to release a fog of purple spores
A security guard sleeps in his Jeep with a beanie over his eyes
In spring you needed a permit but now you can drive right in to the handicapped spot facing the lake covered in snow
I thought, why not drive to the lake, see it covered in snow, see what life there is
I switch from sense to sense. I listen to 88.9. I look out the windshield and see
a bird on a branch rearrange its wings. A woman sleepwalks in a pink sweater
to where you can catch sunfish in summer. I taste the banana’s creamy fruit.
What is there of nature to explore at the lake in winter? How is the ecology interacting?
Some red berries have turned brown. Months after not nursing, my milk is still creamy and white
making me like trees I see not bleeding sap, liquid in the xylem of cells, a private ecology.
The parking lot is usually full, now it’s empty. No sounds of cicadas, crickets, flies, barking dogs
or children. The silence of the patient fisherman is winter. The swan boats with gold-glitter beaks that are docked. The sky is white, pearl white, like light through a thin piece of bone, and I want what I can’t have today. When I first saw the cardinals eating red berries, I didn’t recognize their brutality, that part of me in winter hidden below the elegance of snow.