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It wasn’t so easy, I had to entice
them, lure them with seeds and a little brown rice,

bestow lavish praise, use a good bit of coddling
so I could determine the path of their waddling.

The hooded merganser with hair sticking out
insisted on posing and strutting about.

The wood duck, so gaudy, was very ill-bred,
the mallard kept nodding his emerald head.

The Disney cartoon with her bright orange bill
and painted blue eyes, simply could not stand still.

A tidy, straight line was my heartfelt intention,
but seemed to require a Divine Intervention.

But just for a split second, there they all were.
It didn’t last long, they were soon a mere blur –

a great choir of quacking, and then skyward bound.
I’m left with just feathers and poop on the ground.