The narrow stream, the Owl Creek,
narrows further here,
the treeline wall along this path
breaking open in places.
Where a sidestream enters,
a heron stands sentinel
awaiting a squiggling frog
to gig or a slow minnow.
Shaking out wing feathers
it lifts webless toes
at the end of a stark leg
and steps solemnly forward.
Then it rises, breath-catching
quick, as air and water
ripple from what happened,
a quiet vacancy.
The flightpath is low
leading to what awaits
when we no longer inhabit
this world, the world remains.
The heron is not a symbol.
It is always a heron incarnate,
when it arrives and departs.
And so are the living comforted.
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Beautiful and meaningful! Thank you for drawing my attention to the silent presence in life, a wonderful mystery. Your poem encourages me to observe life’s rhythms around me and to give thanks.
this is a gorgeous poem
presence and absence, beauty in silence and in movement,
its all there, always!
I’ll soon be in Minnesota fishing, pondering herons as the sun sets.