Taking Care

Scatter the seed.

Put out fruit and nuts.

Sit by the window and watch

as none come that morning.

Swallow your coffee, the grounds

bitter at the bottom of the cup.

When at last they appear,

hours, maybe days, later,

you want to ask where they’ve been,

why they left you.

You don’t, because you know

they won’t answer. Instead,

you step outside, a giant

bowl of food in your hands.

Jo Angela Edwins has published poems in over 100 journals and anthologies, including Calyx, The Hollins Critic, descant, and Zone 3. She is the author of the collection A Dangerous Heaven (2023) and the chapbooks Play (2016) and Bitten (2025). She teaches at Francis Marion University in Florence, SC, and serves as the first poet laureate of the Pee Dee region of South Carolina.