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Morning Matins

Birds of diverse attitudes
join voice to sing beatitudes.
The stodgiest cannot refrain
from joining every day again—
unrepentant in their choices,
upon awakening, to join voices.
This reunion stirs the world.
Squirrels in their burrows tightly curled,
unwind to greet the light of day
as inch by inch it lifts its ray.
The donkey lifts its voice to bray
and chickens, as they strain to lay,
raise their clucks to join the chorus,
the world’s alarm clock sounding for us.
The whole world wakening, bit by bit,
prompting us all to wake with it.

Prompts today are: stodgy, beatitude, inch and reunion. And yes, I know that’s a rooster, not a chicken, but although they didn’t make the poem, roosters are the best alarm of all.