They worked all summer

filling each pore with a woven ball

of soft white cotton pulled from their insides.

Their nests hung inverted

like sunflowers whose seeds

had been stolen by imaginary squirrels.

We chased away the children

who flung misshapen stones at the

corners of our porch from three stories below.

We even turned away the exterminator

when he offered to get rid of them with pyrethrum-

they were too harmless outside of the screen,

and too inspirational.

On humid evenings when candles dripped

on the pavement and the neighbors sat arguing

about what to watch on Tuesday night television,

we watched them sleep

like winged teardrops of wax

stiffened by the exhaled breath of our lungs.

In the morning, as you drank coffee and smoked,

they kept busy in slow mechanical movements,

building up the papier-mâché nest that hung on

a capillary thin piece of twine.

They gave us a reason to come home,

a reason to remain outside in the sweltering humidity,

and a reason to sit and talk-

while an entirely new generation was about to be born.