The Promise

How do these birds survive the bleakness of winter?
– Naturalist Newsletter
Lie down, fiery ground.
But remember your embers and nudge
their buried lights when winter's white denies
I'm still around.
Cached seed, I know your whereabouts
in pine-cone scale, know when to strip and pry.
Dried berries bristling
by snow-blocked road, my delicacy,
churn my body heat to round
my plumage for storage, expansive and patient.
Consider what you've heard.
Wings pulled in by windbreak shrub,
I'm undeterred.