“The Arctic Terns’ circumpolar migration takes them to every ocean and near every continent. It’s an exhausting life, and researchers still aren’t sure how they find the energy to do it.”
– Sabrina Imbler, Audubon Magazine
1.
Everything new grows out of what has been.
The cartographies of stars by which we steer
sent out those necessary beacons when
the earth we hover over wasn’t here.
We fly by fate, by self-cast augury
the stars are synapses, an infinite part
of the universe inside our heads, our free
will-less intelligence like angels matched
only by the desire of foxes, raptors.
When the egg goes down a dark throat still unhatched
or fails to hatch for a number of other factors
only then we sense the foe of flight
and know, not darkness, but the lack of light.
2.
We know, not darkness, but the lack of light
in our souls despite the stars and wet
ribbons of color fulgurating night.
we weep by waters blue as blue can get
and ice as white as silence. When the whales
blow clouds beneath us, we play in the spray
but our dim eyes are empty. What are souls
who cannot rest, who never cease to pray?
Hollow-eyed choristers, music of the spheres
birds of hours, heart-beat, wing-beat, beaten
by beauty, oceans scarred with thoughts of stars
we hold, though are not, that which we hold certain,
the finality of a storm-beleaguered coast
surrendered to sea, no longer hurt or lost.
3.
Surrendered to sea, no longer hurt or lost
my eyes lie on a shore beyond my vision.
I am a phantom moving through the frost
and froth of ocean air with pained precision
and wild desire, scalpelling through surf
with silver wings to snipe a scaley soul
resting my soft belly on frozen earth
then casting off to seek the other pole.
When home is not enough, I find another.
When that is not enough, then I return.
No friend, no love, no brood, no easy weather
will ever press to permanence my sojourn.
Something there is that haunts beneath my skin
and keeps me going out and back again.
4.
What keeps me going out and back again?
Ancient Egyptians used to carefully
hollow out their dead, discard the brain
preserve the organs. Soaked in sin, a heavy
heart spelled doom. No matter what its talents
it would be weighed against a single feather
and eaten if the scales did not stay balanced.
The soul in life was two parts locked together
in death each made its own eternal flight
one to guard the living family
one to bask in heaven’s joy and light
nesting in the tomb at night. But we
toil to and from dark, lonely zones
oppressed by heavy hearts and hollow bones.
5.
Oppressed by heavy hearts and hollow bones
there is no country for old birds. The snow
comes swifter now, and we must go. The stones
sing softly from a vacant shore. Below
the sea spreads like a shadow. That first mouthful
of mid-atlantic openness and fish
impresses on trajectory a south pull
toward the cold twin of this pole. No wish
to rest or settle on those easy shores
with surplus certainties of food and rest
wasting this little life. We dip our oars
in glacial mysteries, we build our nests
upon the void, and are become the travelers
who have spun space and have been time’s unravellers.
6.
Who has spun space and has been time’s unraveller?
Long ago in Israel, God decreed
the fiftieth year would be a leveler,
debts were forgiven, every slave was freed,
every hour of that year was holy,
and every day, a blessed day of rest.
But my whole lifetime is my jubilee
and every place through which I pass is blessed.
Somersaulting above an empty sea
below an empty sky, my wings spread wide
as tidal waves. I take infinity
divinity, and eternity in stride.
Here is no measure to prove that I am small.
I am the only one, so I am all.
7.
I am the only one, so I am all
I can rely on, when a cross-wind batters
my sides and tears my feathers. If I fall
into the hungry heart of seething waters
no one will rescue me. There’ll be no bard
to sing my failure or my odyssey.
The way is lonely and the work is hard
and what I love will have lain waste to me.
I long for rest, and yet to rest is death
and when I nest, I wish that I were flying.
If the wind fails, I soar on on my own breath
but oh, to soar so long alone is trying.
Who chose to lock us each in our own body
a share of joy that none may share with me?
8.With a share of joy that none may share with me
I’ve seen green islands bloom from deadened lava,
graveyards send up splendid cypress trees,
and plumes of carambola and guayaba
bow and shower their immaculate fruit
like old temptations strayed from mythic gardens
into the slums of the most destitute.
I’ve seen backs bend beneath their unjust burdens
but disconnected from their discontent
my wings incapable of being lended
I coast the coasts of every continent
with a disinterested eye intended
only to watch, as broken and built again
everything new grows out of what has been.
AUSTIN DEWAR 