Archive
05/22/10 - (1)
No Two Sunrises
It's a chilly 5:25 — The precise minute sunrise is supposed to materialize. Only, my eyes would be the first to notify you,
As they have me, seated down here, at dock's end, That no such event is occurring on their watch, This wet Saturday dawn
Filled with infestations of pesky, mosquito-like insects Destined for wide spider-nets Connected to every post holding this pier in place,
And for the beaks of black swifts navigating the high sky, Twisting, tracking, wheeling, as they feed on the atmosphere, Screeching like bats swirling in dank caves.
Indeed, though I awakened at 5:15, to see the sun coming up, An impenetrable layer of black-gray clouds Has dashed my aspirations, made me miss one of my delights.
Suddenly, my head is all resonances, reverberations: The persistence and sheer disturbing racket Of a Canada-goose gander standing sentinel over Earth,
Honking as if to silence a thousand Sousa marching bands (It must think itself the haughtiest of Chanticleers; Meanwhile, all those sleeping villagers in range wish it dead);
A convocation of caw-cawing crows, Arising from every tree lining all ten miles of shoreline, Doing what it can, to drown out the boisterous gander; A raucous motorboat, low in the stern, with cargo, Radiating waves that escalate into lap-lap-lapping, Until dock and shore are part of the undulating lake,
Whose heartbeat I monitor, with my psyche's stethoscope, Listening to its seminal rhythms, primeval pulsations, Feeling its life blood flow through my arteries, heart, brain;
In the near distance, a minstrelsy of mourning doves Doing their too-familiar cooing, repeatedly — "Ooah-ooo-oo-oo, ooah-ooo-oo-oo, ooah-ooo-oo-oo."
Now, though I'm wearing no timepiece on my wrist, I sense morning's minute hand Has long since fidgeted past 5:25, racing toward six,
And still no signs of sun behind the thick cloud cover. But into the mix, my tympanums add yet another echo, That of a pileated woodpecker's pneumatic jackhammering
To the background orchestration of fugal cacophonies Emanating from swifts, the goose, crows, doves, And, now, two or three crying loons.
Within shivering seconds, walking over the wooden planks, I make my way back up to the cabin, Where the warm bed I left, forty-five minutes ago, awaits me.
I'm elated to have learned, for the first time, I believe, That no two sunrises look the same, ever can, And that some are infinitely more visual, for being heard.
05/22/10 - (1)
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