Poem Archive

Whatever I Can Make of This I Have

The brisk rubbing together of the hands,
my Asian apology for the innumerable lapses of love. 
The heart’s big ship too often moored.

The new day, nevertheless, coming right on schedule.

The lighted world a blue mote, a morning sweet
God rolls in His mouth.

A sprinkling of goldeneyes, feeding on kelp. 

Failure, whatever I can make of you, I have.
You’re like a new bride coming into the room.
Petals floating in a white dish. 

Everything’s forgiven.

— from Wu Wei

The Toll Birds Take

You have to understand the toll birds take,
perched or on the wing,
concentrated beauty is a war of nerves.
One can enter you from any direction
and a fly-through, even by the common sparrow
can take out the heart.
That’s the nature of ambush,
something that lies in wait: a nuthatch
walking perpendicular
down a tree, dressed to kill,
ruined me for several years. Now
I take precautions, cover my eyes
to the Wood Duck, stand back
from the window in winter
when the chickadees come to feed.
Snow is a bad thing where any birds gather,
so much color is always a show of force.
Look at the ancient crow,
A black glove on the landscape,
one finger always mocking you.
He was ugly, but when Herby Poole
stood up in class in the eighth grade
and imitated the songs of several birds,
including the difficult vireo,
we were never the same.
That was years ago and he died,
don’t birds die, birds above all things
who unnerve us just in passing,
who leave us breathless and sad?

— from The Names of Birds

How to Draw a Better Bird

Festival Workshop at Lake Almanor

Resist eloquence. Get mad.
If your bird is the snowy Clark’s Grebe,
if that’s your bird, the one out there
sitting on its eggs in a floating nest—stunning bird,
serene bird—if that’s all you see, then it’s no good.
You might just as well take your iPhone out,
take a picture for Audubon. That’s not a better bird.
Better you try to draw the bird almost gone,
banging its wings against your heart.
Scare us. Make it real, like an eraser big as a house.
What you feel knowing the bird’s clutch
will never hatch. End of a colony.
Gone bird.
Our lives, once a wetland,
drained, is the bird you want to draw.

— from Such a Waste of Stars