Wildsong
John Daniel
The Heron
I am always watching
the single heron at its place
alone at water, its open eye,
one leg lifted
or wading without seeming to move.
It is a mystery seen
but never touched
until this morning
when I lift it from its side
where it lies breathing.
I know the beak that could attack,
that unwavering golden eye
seeing me, my own saying I am harmless,
but if I had that eye, nothing would be safe.
The claws hold tight my hand,
its dun brown feathers, and the gray
so perfectly laid down.
The bird is more beautiful
than my hand, skin, more graceful
than my foot, my own dark eye,
so much more vulnerable,
the heart beating quickly,
its own language speaking,
You could kill me or help me.
I know you and I have no choice
but to give myself up
and in whatever supremacy of this moment,
hold your human hand
with my bent claws.
Linda Hogan
Idledale, Colorado
The Gift
Beneath silver is feather, beneath feather
is dream,
open and porous
as the flow of the spring river,
steady as the trebling of this cricket
in pink roses
here at Point Reyes as night
comes down. Beneath
waiting is breathing, beneath breathing
is light's
last yellow wash
above the ocean; calm deepens
as the irises and lilies
rise beyond
the window where despite the cloudy skies-
first stars.
Think of the sea, shifting and singing all night
at the beach,
the quicksilver spiders
spinning all night in the wooden shed-
think of the darkness
that fills them
as their time goes on without you.
And yourself
in this same darkness-
it flows beneath your skin,
beneath the pulses of your waking;
it is the promise, the gift.
The shadowy face
that is yours
gazes wavering back at you
by candlelight in the window.
Ann Fisher-Wirth
Oxford, Mississippi
Exchange
-Fairbanks, Alaska
As I peeled birch bark
with a borrowed blade
from fresh stove-cut lengths
piled behind my friend's cabin
the small knife slipped,
strange in my hand,
to lift flesh from my finger,
as easily as white bark
slid from the dry inner wood.
Two Whiskeyjack jays
spoke from black spruce branches
and I felt the tundra come awake
with new life as those red drops fell,
melting permafrost
in an ancient exchange,
my blood for that gift.
Joseph Bruchac
Greenfield Center, New York
