Branch Sitters

Three doves sit quietly in the morning sun on the battered old branch over my garden. They often keep so still it’s difficult to tell them from the gnarls and patterns of the branch, long weathered and pecked by woodpeckers and chewed by squirrels into an abstract pattern all its own.

They remind me of the “bench sitters”, retired older men who, in good weather, sit on the benches along Main Street, quietly exchanging comments with each other now and then, happy enough for the quiet company of old friends.