Listening Meditation.

Birds overhead
 and the rain sweeping violently over the roof in sprays
 snatched by the winds and torn away
 then lashed on the rooftops again.
 Birds fly over
 giggling 
 and calling as they pass.
 The cat doesn’t like it.
 Meows
 a startled birdish chirrup
 and jogs over to me.
 In the left ear
 gas burning
 in muted and droning roar.
 To the right
 the rain dashed on the window glass
 spittered
 closer than the swirling roar inside the walls 
 beneath the ceiling.
 Birds call overhead
 again
 these screeching and squarked calls
 bickering as they go.
 Now footsteps 
 in another house’s hallway
 (though there’s nobody home)
 thumping
 they vibrate through the floorboards
 and rumble
 in the floors.
 No voices
 only the birds calling and bickering
 and giggling 
 as they go.