Aubade

The criers of dawn
are not birds, chattered
among black limbs and leaves,
nor the red flushed east,
nor the soft extinguished
stars too far to kindle
a more rapturous morn. No,
the quickened break
as the last three fireflies,
spurned and furiously virgin,
burn and fall into the dousing
grass to feed — then sleep.

Image: toan phan on Unsplash