Lifted by flight and song
BALD EAGLES
Today my heart leaped up as I
Beheld two monarchs of the air
Circling over White Oak Drive
In search of errant squirrel and hare.
As their black wings sailed on the wind,
The sun lit up white heads and tails.
They made four sweeping rounds until
They headed north for our Great Bay.
The Bay’s their winter habitat
With osprey, loon, black duck and grebe.
We’re glad to have our eagles back:
They awe us with their majesty.
CALL OF THE WILD
Driving north in the pelting rain
I see a line of wild geese arrowing
Southwest toward more clement climes,
Harvest gleanings on their minds.
I hear the faint persistent calls
By which they organize themselves.
Already one is flapping forward
To take the lead, relieve his comrade.
Why is it that I feel compulsion
To join this southerly migration?
Is it the winter that I’d flee
Or would I be one of that company?
THE WORKS OF JAYS
As autumn leaves begin to fall,
Blue jays suddenly appear.
Although we do not hear them call
They fitfully flit here and there.
All summer they have silently
Flown about their busy-ness.
Some say that they’ve been stealthily
Stealing from their neighbors’ nests.
In spring we heard them constantly
Sounding their rude and raucous cries,
Warning their fellow flyers away
From male-selected nesting sites.
But now it is the acorn crop
That they are fiercely focused on,
Interring nuts in shallow tombs
For winter harvest under snow.
It’s said, without their ministries
Our oaks would not be so widespread:
And so it is that minor deeds
Have wide and weighty consequence.
THE SCENE AT SWASEY PARKWAY
See how the shifting wind
Caresses the marsh grasses
Across the Squamscott River,
Bending them this way and that,
Scaring up little brown birds
Chased by the shadowy wave,
While unconcerned, on the water,
Dozens of ducklings circle
Around their mallard dams,
And cormorants sleekly swim,
Slip below the surface,
And bill up wriggling fish,
Eliciting jealous squawks
From two competing ring bills.
ENCOUNTER
We dip our paddles stealthily.
The heron eyes us warily.
Too young to have acquired fear,
He wonders why we have come here.
Water lilies are his rug.
He elegantly gives a shrug
And makes his graceful ballet jete
To move away some fifteen feet,
Then settles down to keep a watch
On strange intruders drifting past.
We paddle onward carefully,
Happy this water nymph to see.
WILD HARVEST
Icelanders know where sea birds live
In crevice and cranny, on crag and cliff.
Icelanders know how to climb
And where to look and at what time.
The locals have learned just how to take
Their eggs from murres and kittiwakes:
Not too many and just when
So every hen will lay again.
Stormy petrels and razorbills,
Fulmars, gannets and wagtails:
In markets you will see them all
Colored, speckled, large and small.
They cannot get enough of puffins
Yet puffin populations boom
And eider ducks produce big eggs
As well as marketable down.
Sheerwaters and guillemots,
Only the ravens are their foes.
Icelanders know what they’re worth:
Icelanders are for the birds.
This morning as I drove down our street
(No April fool!) I saw a real bald eagle
Perched high up in a leafless tree,
Feathers held close in the frosty air,
Keeping his eagle eye fixed upon
The newly black surface of Brickyard Pond
So recently rid of its lid of ice.
I’m sure he was thinking it would be nice
To spot a fishy shape moving there
Or a careless robin along the shore.
At breakfast I had been pleased to see
A house finch in the blue spruce tree
Below my window, ready to hop
Back into the sheltered nest in its top-
Most branches, last year’s nestling,
No doubt on the lookout for a mate,
Thinking of making a tentative date
As soon as the sun warms up the air
To check out the housing situation
And get some eggs ready to sit on.
At last, when I had got back home,
Ready to close the garage door,
A cardinal bugled his announcement calls:
“I’m here! I’m here! Don’t come near!”
I got the message loud and clear:
Elusive spring is finally here!
EPIPHANY
Veiled by thickly falling snow,
Winter robins come and go.
From my window I can see
Them flocking in the tall pear tree.
Startled by the passing plow,
Scattering in a frantic cloud,
Flitting, fluttering, never still,
They seldom pause to eat their fill.
Off the roof a sudden gust
Convinces them they’ve had enough.
I wish them luck, I wish, “God Speed!”
I hope they find sustaining seed.
I’m glad I’ve had this chance to know
Winter robins in the snow.
(January 2, 2014)
ADAPTING
The towhees keep us company
For a little while along the edge
Of this high ridge road, hopping
Like robins, pecking like hens for bugs
Cocooned on crackling oak leaves
Loosened from snow by slanting midday
Winter sun. We’ve never
Seen them up close before. In summer
They scrabble in shadows, but now
The white painter’s cloth spread out
Over the forest floor
Herds them into the roadside leaves.
They are not ptarmigan, bleaching
Their browns to blend into blank
Surroundings. Towhees make do
With leftover camouflage from autumn.
EVENING BALLET
Foot-lighted by fluorescent
Jacarandas more purple than amethysts,
Against a backdrop of sunset
And mountains, the egrets
Perform in black pines:
Backflap for landings, soar
With tightly curled necks, and
Like slim ebony carvings
Balance on tree tops.
Their roof-top audience
Of American writers,
Refueled with creative juices,
Applaud along with yawping nighthawks.
GIVING THANKS
Meandering out of the village the car
Shudders and stops short
To let a bronze native turkey
Hurtle across the tar-top
Almost under the wheels, desperate,
Floundering into the furze.
The sacrificial victim flees
The carnage. One wants to cheer
As when Canadian geese last week
Gleaned in Farmer Burdick’s
Cornfield, undisturbed by chattering
Guns or barking curs.
(Reutemann Road poems 1960-1972)
ROLE MODELS
Mourning doves are Quaker ladies
Sedate, subdued and graceful,
Habited in buff and gray with sable
Accents and tapering tails.
Muslim women congregating
At the well, they softly wait
Until among the seeds a space
For feeding makes itself available.
Nodding their heads they circulate
With delicate steps, amiable
Party guests, unruffled, contained,
For simple favors grateful.