The 3 AM bird may not be real;
I usually hear it after starting

from a dream, this time lightning
and thunder, but the brightest

I could imagine, the most
ear-cracking.  I had to get up

and walk around the darkened
house, half-sure someone

had tried to break in. Nothing.
I had smelled smoke, saw

sparks cascading from
the roof before I woke.

The 3 AM bird called again,
what could it be saying

at such an hour?  It’s true
the sky was changing

its character, the line
between night and morning

a fluid one.  Got a glass
of water, went back to bed,

listening as it sang its peculiar
lonely song to the morning

arriving, calm and gray,
ash after the fires.