In corner of the junkyard:
a metal mailbox rusted shut,
no letters kept, its flag still raised,
its wooden post no longer there.
Struck by something years ago,
a rounded hole within its side
provides a makeshift home for birds
so done with trees now razed away
for stores and roads or restaurants.
Aside from shifting in the wind,
the box contains as well protects;
hence this nest of hungry mouths
searching blindly in the light
awaiting their delivery
of morsels brought across the field,
through a maze of mangled parts
- wheels, axles, doors, and glass
mixed with mud and uncut grass.
At sunrise, this interior
stays lit for several minutes long,
enough to mark the start of day
and send these dwellers into song.
A correspondence wrought of waste
and urgency of life: survive
however beings will contrive.