The Necessary Liquid

Gulls and ravens on high pond,
Still a disk of ice except
Around its muddy margins,

As the trucks and SUVs
Trawl up the slope, one by one,
At ten-minute intervals,

Give or take, to see how spring
In the high-country snowmelt
Is coming along. The gulls

Wheel and take off from the pond
Like winged chips of dirty ice.
The ravens simply patrol,

And each pickup and so forth
Pauses, maybe disgorges
Someone who takes a picture,

And then turns to drive back down.
The transformation of ice
Into water has drawn them

Like witnesses to a birth.
Precious little’s going on,
Just the trick that makes life work.