letting the stars name me
after them—
unpronounceable things happen
*
building a throne
out of meadowlark song—
kingdom with no borders
*
holding hands with the sun
wishing it would go
to second base
Posts Tagged ‘birds’
Three Present Progressives
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged birds, haiku sequence, stars, sun on July 11, 2020| Leave a Comment »
Waiting for the Trill
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged be here now, birds, red wing blackbird, silence, waiting on May 1, 2020| 3 Comments »
Just a few steps from the house
I find a place to sit on a rock
and wait for the trill of the red wing blackbird.
I have waited twenty years to hear it here
in my back yard full of water and willows
and quiet. All day, though intermittent, I’ve heard it.
Funny how much I enjoy the waiting tonight—
perhaps because I know that eventually
the bright call will come. It is, perhaps, like a girl,
waiting through her first date for her first kiss—
she’s pretty sure it will happen, and now, after
years of waiting, she suddenly has
all the time in the world. In fact, the waiting
is delicious—like champagne, dry, with tiny bubbles.
Like summer’s first raspberries—a little too tart,
and yet sweet enough to eat another and another.
I sit in the goldening world and wait and wait.
I listen to the jays as they squawk and the warbler’s
sharp chirp. The wind teases my hair and I wait
until I forget I am waiting, simply noticing the world.
By the time I hear the familiar trill, it greets me
like the old friend it is, then it’s silent again.
The way the sun seems most lovely just before it’s gone,
that’s how the silence holds me.
Opening the Deepest Ears
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged awakening, birds, kingfisher, song, waking up on April 13, 2020| Leave a Comment »
The kingfisher wakes me
with its strident rattle,
thrilling me out of sleep.
It’s been months since
I’ve seen one, and now
on this snowy morning
one clatters and chatters
me into spring.
The heart leaps up,
surprised it doesn’t
have wings. I’m here,
it beats, its own tuneless call.
Like the kingfisher, it’s ready
to dive into the deep.
I’m here, it calls again
from inner branches.
It need not be beautiful,
the song that reminds us
who we are—it calls to us
in its own undecipherable way
until one day when we hear it,
we can’t help but hear
our own name.
The News
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged birds, Corona Virus, fear, geese, news, pond, wilderness on March 16, 2020| 6 Comments »
Just as I had settled into doom,
I heard the wild call of the first geese of spring
come screeching through the window.
I leapt up like a woman desperate
for good news—leapt up and ran to the window
in time to see a pair land on the pond,
splashing against the water. They quieted
immediately after alighting. And then,
there was only the sound of me watching them.
How graceful they were in the pond,
the water wrinkled behind them, as if their arrival
were the only news, the only news worth telling.
One Before Evening Comes
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged birds, cranes, hope on February 23, 2020| Leave a Comment »
in the dry field of hope
the rattling bugle of sandhill cranes—
the sky alive with great wings
The Scientists at Yale are Wondering
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged birds, evolution, heart, poem, poetry, science on August 11, 2019| Leave a Comment »
They know that birds see many more colors
than humans can—and they know that
their plumage has become, over millions of years,
more colorful, more dazzling, more bright.
But why, they wonder, can the birds see
colors they do not have in their feathers?
Why haven’t they developed the ability
to produce ultraviolet yellow or ultraviolet red?
I know that there is beauty I see in others
that I do not yet see in myself: People
who leave bottles of water in the desert
of west Texas. A 94-year-old man in Iowa
who has given away 6,000 Hershey’s
milk chocolate bars to connect
with the people in his changing hometown.
A 13-year-old girl who has raised $80,000
to save dogs from being euthanized.
A woman who chooses forgiveness.
I want to believe that to see is to invite evolution.
I want to believe that through sight, my own heart will develop
the way plumage might, more dazzling, more bright.
How I Stopped Eating Sugar on my Corn Flakes
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged birds, brain, flight, memory, poem, poetry on November 3, 2016| 2 Comments »
Somewhere in the 100 billion cells
of my brain is the memory
of the playground in second grade
when Jenny told me birds could fly
because their bones were hollow,
and, she reasoned, if we could lose
enough weight, we, too,
could have hollow bones, and we, too
could fly.
Surely linked to that memory
are thousands of other neurons
that disprove her claim—
neurons related to air pressure, thrust,
strong breast muscles, osteoporosis—
but there is, perhaps,
still one cell in there somewhere
across the synaptic gap,
that lights up at the memory
of Jenny’s suggestion
as if to say,
wow, that’s cool,
let’s try it.
Phylogenetic
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged birds, classification, poem, poetry, questions on October 12, 2016| 1 Comment »
Just today my son asked
if birds were mammals.
No, I said, without looking up.
Then are they reptiles, he said,
and I thought no, but then
I thought maybe, and then I said,
I don’t know. Turns out some
classify yes and others say no.
There are so many ways
to see the world.
I think of scaly feet and believe
the crocodile and heron
could be cousins.
I think of intersections.
It’s not a surprise
humans arrive at different answers,
what surprises me is how
there are questions I no longer ask.
Like the nature of a bird.
Like the nature of love.
How many other questions
are gathering dust or are waiting
to be found?
Migration
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged autumn, birds, fall, poem, poetry on October 20, 2013| 1 Comment »
the bird inside me
migrated
I miss its song—
this morning was so quiet
watching frost melt
on the fallen leaves
*
did I, too, forget
how to sing?
did I also
fly away
from myself?
*
my hands
do not need to be asked—
they move unbidden
to touch the places
on my body
where the pain
unfolds
*
and here
and here
and here—
touch me here
and here
and here
*
what use is a tongue?
what use is song?
what use these hands?
what use silence?
*
who is the one
who thinks of the world
in terms of usefulness?
*
it was a long time
before I heard
the leaves had a song
of their own
but only
when
I moved
*
the nest
is still here
inside—when
you’re not looking
I fold up my
silence, my
hands, my
wants
and hide
*
is it
so wrong
sometimes
I pretend
I am
gone
A Hunger
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged birds, love, poem, poetry, relationship on August 10, 2013| 1 Comment »
There is a thistle patch
between me
and the raw place in you
I would like to kiss.
I can see from here how wounded
it is, and how much good
just one little kiss
would do if only
you would let me
so tenderly kiss you.
Instead you throw
more thistle seeds
into the patch.
Oh darling, I get it.
I have pockets of thistle seeds, too.
Why is it so hard to love?
And so I put on the battle gear
to make it through the spines.
But I can see in your eyes
how scary that must look,
me in all that armor, thick gloves,
long shears.
I don’t have any answers.
I despise these gloves.
But here come the finches,
the juncos, pine siskins.
Look, lover,
here come the mourning doves.