I think they stand out on the ice wishing they

would fall through.

I don’t think a single wing would lift 

as the black water lets them plummet in.

The constant hushing of the motorway

zooms constant in the nearness.

It threatens them with eternal silence,

the very thing they pine for

yet cannot recall

and will undoubtedly fade into.

That February sun stares at them

breathing the hot air of doom with a yellow snicker

as the temperature is thirty degrees higher 

than it was this time three years ago.

Their plumage too thick around them

to feel the world is ending.

But their webbed toes feel it―

I am certain of it, I unzip my jacket―

as the ice bends around their toes

and gives way.