Visitors.

I heard them from across the house:
A thousand fingernails screeching down a chalkboard.
At the back door, I stood in awe.
Distinct voices sounded one after the other in a magnificent chorus:
All sang fortissimo.
We had visitors today.
What they were calling for or why they stopped here,
I still don’t know.
Odd. Then erie. Then miraculous.
We had an unseasonably warm day:
No breeze or wind blew through our trees.
For a moment, from every perchable place, little black birds sang to me.
It went on about ten minutes or so.
A few more birds came and stood,
But none moved from their marks.
A deafening noise, I could imagine it driving some crazy.
For me, it was soothing.
The petite sopranos squawked full-throated until,
At last, all were quiet.
Suddenly, the thunderous flopping of a thousand little wings,
a blanket of black arrows pointing southward, and the visitors were gone.
Left with only silence and stillness, my ears rang.