Flight School 
A poem by Peter M. Gordon

Flight School 
 
 
Mid-February, Central Florida 
Bare tops of maples, sweetgum, sycamore, 
reach for the sky along Windy Wood Drive  
and sway with weight of dozens of common 
 
grackles resting after practice flights.  
Blue black feathers make them easy  
to spot against brown branches. They  
are snowbirds, like other families in 
 
my neighborhood. Safe in treetops thirty feet high,  
the grackles catch their breath, squawk back  
and forth to critique previous practices. Only perfect  
formations will survive the perilous journey north. 
 
Eleven AM is the best time to observe aerial ballet. 
Neighborhood’s still, except for my sheltie, Robbie, 
and I, walking slowly, listening to squawks, clacks, 
and whistles from a squadron of birds like jets 
 
revving before takeoff. Two quick “caws,” answered 
with squeaks resembling a hundred rusty gates,  
and a black cloud of beating wings ascends fifty 
feet above trees, whirl around some predetermined 
 
center, form a black “W” against blue clear sky, fly 
half a block to the sycamore behind Mrs. Olson’s house.  
Debrief each other in bursts of birdsong before they fly 
again. By March they must be ready to head north. 
 
Ancient Roman augurs sought truth in bird behavior.  
The Empire lasted 1000 years making decisions based  
on auspices. I wonder what Being arranged today’s lesson 
that even birds must practice to perfect their purpose.

About the Author:

Peter M. Gordon won the Thomas Burnett Swan Poetry Prize awarded by the Gwendolyn Brooks Writer’s Association of Florida. He’s published over 100 poems and two collections. Peter is a founder and current President of Orlando Area Poets, a chapter of the Florida State Poets Association. He hosts the FSPA’s monthly open mic and teaches in Full Sail University’s Film Production MFA program. 

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