I pass him every morning, and one day finally stopped to LOOK at him. I found his perfection moving, and at the same time was disturbed by these thoughts:
Wings raised
Wings raised, the noble predator
will never know release
(unless some cataclism come,
to set free every beast.)
Untried, the females of his kind,
no nest was ever his.
He guards a garden and a house,
for him, that’s all there is.
I wonder if he chafes within.
Can iron have a heart?
It’s my suspicion that he does.
How cruel of Vulcan’s art
to freeze him there on someone’s fence
before he could depart!
Poolside Laureate 