It was winter, near freezing,
I'd walked through a forest of firs
when I saw issue out of the waterfall
a solitary bird.
It lit on a damp rock,
and, as water swept stupidly on,
wrung from its own throat
supple, undammable song.
It isn't mine to give.
I can't coax this bird to my hand
that knows the depth of the river
yet sings of it on land.
-- The Dipper by Kathleen Jamie from 'Selected Poems'
"So I walked as day was dawning
Where small birds sang and leaves were falling
Where we once watched the rowboats landing
On the broad majestic Shannon"
"But now, both parents dead,
it was time, I thought, I had the time and
courage, I thought, and I found the letters—
I was going to say, in the last place I looked,
but of course, where else?"
"These all spring up
from dimness to full life again
because of you, as if they were no more
than low reliefs carved badly in black slate
until you shine."
"the heron was in the same place,
same pose. If it was the same heron. Or perhaps
only the same me, same pose, driving past,
threading my car between casual accidental
invitations of no railing along the causeway."
"To the shadow I had left alone before I
crossed the border, my shadow that stayed
lonely and hid in the dark of the night,
freezing where it was, never needing a visa."
"Yesterday, I buried another squirrel.
Every morning, he’d gnaw on my plastic lawn chairs,
shavings accumulating across his tiny organs.
Is his death political? Everything is.
Different, though, those two politics, dying for and dying of."
"All night I dream about a man with a crossbow
at the bottom of the ocean. I guzzle vodka from an unlabeled bottle.
You'll be even drunker, he explains, on your way back up."
Closing the book, I find I have left my head
inside. It is dark in here, but he chapters open
their beautiful spaces and give a rustling sound,
words adjusting themselves to their meaning.
Long passages open at successive pages. An echo,
continuous from the title onward, hums
behind me. From in here, the world looms,
a jungle redeemed by these linked sentences
carved out when an author traveled and a reader
kept the way open. When this book ends
I will pull it inside-out like a sock
and throw it back in the library. But the rumor
of it will haunt all that follows in my life.
A candleflame in Tibet leans when I move.
--Mary Oliver
"Wakes up a wisp of leaf.
A shrivelled lung.
Lifts her head & weeps.
Wades deep into heavy water & floats her dead man.
Or sinks into his gaping pool."
"The weaver bird built in our house
And laid its eggs on our only tree.
We did not want to send it away.
We watched the building of the nest
And supervised the egg-laying.
And the weaver returned in the guise of the owner."
This is the one song everyone
would like to learn: the song
that is irresistible:
the song that forces men
to leap overboard in squadrons
even though they see beached skulls
the song nobody knows
because anyone who had heard it
is dead, and the others can’t remember.
Shall I tell you the secret
and if I do, will you get me
out of this bird suit?
I don’t enjoy it here
squatting on this island
looking picturesque and mythical
with these two feathery maniacs,
I don’t enjoy singing
this trio, fatal and valuable.
I will tell the secret to you,
to you, only to you.
Come closer. This song
is a cry for help: Help me!
Only you, only you can,
you are unique
at last. Alas
it is a boring song
but it works every time.
-Margaret Atwood
"Broken wood, whole cars lifted and dropped
on top of scattered sea defences, tyres, fridges
the stock market canceling morning trading
I was astonished by the horror"