Fluffy white behemoth of tooth and down
floating in deep night oil speckled with dawn
left in not-yet-morning—wrenched from still night.
Waters’ edge is peace in illusion, flights
of towhees twist between starlight, marking nature’s
webway—the pattern held only in memory
and instinct’s frame. The shudder of memory
can go through a beast, from the swan’s beak down
to its webbed feet filled with great nature’s
call from sinew to stomach. Rise at dawn
and seek the winding water of water, take flight
at danger and settle at dark night’s
drizzle. Listen for sounds that break night
into ripple—what lizard, memory
of a croaking owl crashing mid-flight
into the tender mouse body, blood all down
beak and flank. No revelation dawns
on the swan—no new knowledge of nature
beyond the click in the bones. Nature
is no teacher, there is no daring knight
against the groundling worm, no song sung at dawn
or threnody at twilight. Only the memory
of a swan’s song, at bitter end deep down
in the thing’s gristle, ready to take flight
from barren throat before death. The last flight
into song—feathers formed into nature’s
last gasp of order—to hear a swan, beasts lay down
with beasts, stones sit in silence, blissful night
holds its breath. There is no great memory
in this world to hold it. Trees strive towards dawn,
fish meander upstream, creeping things creeping, dawn
comes again and the world turns again. Vesper flight
swoops and swims again. There is no great memory
of the swan that sings its last—no, nature
flows onward inexorable. Frogs croak in the night,
bubbling, murmuring water washes the downs.
No earth, no beast holds the memory of the great swan song, the dawn
of the new world comes at a downturn. Only catastrophe creates flights
of fancy—rot breeds nature’s newness, an order born of deepest midnight.
