by David Anson Lee
The Thursday After
Every Thursday the same woman arrived with a paper bag of crumbs. She scattered them gently, as though remembering names instead of feeding pigeons. The birds gathered without hurry. They trusted habit more than promises. One Thursday she didn’t come. The bench remained empty. The pigeons circled twice before settling in the grass, waiting longer than seemed reasonable. The following week another woman appeared: perhaps a daughter, perhaps only someone who had noticed.
first frost –
the pigeons
leave room
David Anson Lee is a retired academic ophthalmologist, physician-philosopher, and poet living in Bellaire, Texas. His work explores medicine, blindness, migration, memory, and the fragile connections between people and place. His poems have appeared in Eclectica, Rome Literary Review, The Fib Review, Cordite Poetry Review, and other journals. He writes at davidalee.substack.com.
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