Comments on: The Starlings

By: Dave Bonta

Dave Bonta — Fri, 19 Nov 2010 02:20:03 +0000

In reply to James. Thanks. I tried all kinds of verbs there, and I'm still not sure I picked the best one.

By: James

James — Thu, 18 Nov 2010 23:55:57 +0000

This is so beautifully vivid. I love the dark road across the sky.

By: Dave Bonta

Dave Bonta — Thu, 18 Nov 2010 16:06:07 +0000

In reply to Beth Lowe. Hey, I'm glad you liked that! I'm so often unsure of these poems I throw together late at night, under a self-imposed deadline to post something, anything! before midnight. We don't get icterid flocks up here on the mountain all too often, so haven't had the luxury of growing tired of them. This poem started out being about grackles, but as more and more urban imagery crept in, I decided they had to be starlings, instead. Poetic licence and all.

By: Dave Bonta

Dave Bonta — Thu, 18 Nov 2010 16:02:02 +0000

In reply to JMartin. Oh my god, I love that: Now the long freight of autumn goes smoking out of the land. Thanks!

By: JMartin

JMartin — Thu, 18 Nov 2010 15:43:01 +0000

Satisfying! High winds and (car) alarms before stasis and silence: late autumn is poetry season. I posted McGrath’s Beyond the Red River in the reading rooms this week:

Now the long freight of autumn goes smoking out of the land./My possibles are all packed up, but still I do not leave./I am happy enough here, where Dakota drifts wild in the universe,/Where the prairie is starting to shake in the surf of the winter dark.

http://www.poetryfoundation.org/archive/poem.html?id=177084

By: Beth Lowe

Beth Lowe — Thu, 18 Nov 2010 13:24:40 +0000

You’ve managed to recast and make so striking, even beautiful, something that typically drives me crazy: the onslaught of the starlings. And this: “Today was no longer fall, but fly, with high winds & a fast traffic of clouds.” A line to savor and memorize. No longer fall, but fly. Ah, one of those lines of yours I sorta kinda wish I had written. I have a new favorite Bonta poem. Thanks, Dave.