Cotswold Dove

You lazily circle the patchwork hills
Like a cherub who’s lost his way,
Oh small, feathered cupid, you’re surely as stupid
As you are portly and gray.
 
You fix the limestone chimney
With a witless, black-eyed stare,
Your hooting calls climb over time-mellowed walls
And boxwood hedges square.
 
A rumpus most unseemly
You unfailingly arouse,
When you launch from your perch with a ponderous lurch
And crash over crackling boughs.
 
Yet, in villages enfolded
In medieval memory
Your pert, ring-eyed face belongs in this place
Peering out over tussock and tree.
 
The misty, young moments of morning
Are threaded with your throaty croon,
May the sun always rise to your owlish cries
And the moon always sink to your tune.