Denise Leffers: A favorite poem

The Doves of Vasona
by Parthenia Hicks.

Denise Leffers
Licensed Marriage and Family Therapist
Los Gatos

The Doves of Vasona

the purple-throated doves sit
round and full
under the girders of Highway 17
undaunted by tons of steel
rushing over their nests
of nicks and nacks
sitting two by two
tucked along
the lips of green metal

one slim white mother
speckled with large black spots
stands out from the
smooth soft grey,
a spaniel of a dove,
she eyes me
warily, sizes me up, then
flies to her raftered nest,
lets me see the bobbing heads,
their peeps and pulls

here, she says, here
underneath the Avenue of the Larks
just off the freeway
we fly the same exit home
to the hidden cities beneath the city
beyond county lines
and sub-divisions

here, she calls, here
to the walkers and cyclists
the joggers and the hypnotized
drivers,
to the poets who stumble
in the dark following the symphony
of the roo-coo-coo
as it bounces off the steel
in the chilly, chilly night

Parthenia M. Hicks