In their own way
almost
beautiful
these
ferals dancing
upon
our hillside.
The yellow flowers blooming
far
from home:
French
Flax, Wild Mustard,
Latin names too hard
for
us to learn.
Delicate,
so easy
to
pull out, roots and all,
they
shudder under the sun.
We
discuss methods
of
eradication.
On
the fertile ground
by
the roadside
We
have removed them
with
spray and machete,
but
up here among the rocks
on
our wildest slopes,
they
cling with hope.
No Name but Beauty
I caught a pink snapper
in the first light
pulling from the oil-grey sea
a sliver of dawn,
salmon pink stripes
and blue dots.
eyes too large, the sun
spreading as blood.
Round eyes that saw
unblinking, or did not see
as I did, the last
slow waving of her
webbing on translucent fins
against the cruel air.
I did not know
there are shades between pink and pearl
iridescence, for which there are
no names but beauty.
The Blackbird Sings
For my brother, Mike, who died in 2011
This evening a blackbird sings in the valley below.
I cannot fault his song
nor his determination to be heard,
so deeply sweet, yet sharp in the air.
Finally, it came down to this: a sterile room.
Not the place you would choose for final conversations
a slim hard bed with a view of brick walls and dirty windows
where one small green tree climbed a corner nook.
A limited view, not even clouds passing,
nor bird song, only a series
of cheery ladies with other plans for the evening.
A framed print of a fading magnolia,
or you said, was it two naked ladies?
We laughed till you told me that the wall
had turned red.
Painkillers had side effects.
What horrors await us?
Are there already
lurking under the skin,
or calling us down the long white corridors
to meet us shuffling round the corner
with vacant unsmiling eyes,
shapeless, shape-changing.
We wanted more time
to grow older, grow wiser in some way
possible, but not yet known.
The blackbird has learned his song
from those before.
The memory of others
and a long line of perfecting
and living, not dying
in that moment of release
into the still air beyond brick walls.
