If it calls often,
it’s a hairy woodpecker,
less often: a downy,
never: an ivory-billed.
Each year the ground grows simpler
and the sky more complex.
Right over there,
in a hollow locust tree,
a hive of wild bees used to sleep.
Breaking through
Fresh holes gape in a maple trunk,
as if from some Roman
soldier’s lance.
The new, smooth ground of ice and sleet
hasn’t quite set;
I keep breaking through.
Cardinals peck at the plowed road,
gathering faux teeth
for their reliquaries.
Secondary school
I grew up with a woodstove
instead of a TV. I know all
the theme songs of oak.
If I could unlearn
the names of the birds,
how much freer their flight!
In a dream, I run
through my half-remembered high school
to catch a bus.
Walking the line
High winds. I press an ear
to the trunk of a ridge-top oak
and hear nothing but wind.
My footprints in the snow
are more than erased;
they’re raised up, scattered like ashes.
The woodpecker must hear any sound
an oak can make.
It taps out a response.
Nuthatch
Nuthatch at the window,
probing under the sill
for frozen bugs and pupae,
one eye on the glass
where, behind the bare trees,
my bare face swims up—
that odd ice
on a sideways pond
with its year-round winter…
Primary sources
One line for all
the caravans of the internet—
its wavy shadow.
Looking at bird tracks,
I feel a certain anxiety
of influence.
I chew on a piece
of congealed black cherry sap
from a head-sized burl.
January noon
In the owl’s flight
as in the conifers it left:
that silence.
It’s enormous,
the frozen carcass of a cow
eaten by chickadees.
O trees like forks,
the sky too is a dish
best served cold.
Cold snap
Yes, it’s cold. Continue reading “Cold snap”
2013 in photos: A week in the Caledonian forest
Less than 1 percent of the ancient Caledonian forest remains, much of it in the Abernethy region, where Rachel and I camped for a week in mid July. She wanted to prove to me that real forests still existed in the British Isles. Our first evening there, I went for a walk and discovered this dead sheep. Continue reading “2013 in photos: A week in the Caledonian forest”
In darkest England
Under lowering skies, the lowing herd winds slowly o’er the lea in the village commons at Brill, Buckinghamshire. We were there to attend a big garden party with extended family, friends and assorted villagers, preparations for which gave us just enough time to wander around this extremely picturesque English village. Continue reading “In darkest England”