To Live A Long Time In One Place

 

. . . moving evenly through the warm, temperate,

repetitive events of a life that was not going anywhere

because it was already there; it lived at the center.

        Wallace Stegner, "The Double Corner"

 

 

 

 

And now again the one shadow of a thousand blackbirds

Lifts from the dark trees, each one saying the one thing

Blackbirds know, which is how they follow their hunger

Each morning east toward the light and the stubble field

Not yet tilled, spring rains making a marshy morass of it,

And each evening, slowly and almost without a sound,

Their passage west again to where they and the leaving

Light will darken and settle into the ridge line trees again.

All my life and all my own passages keep coming to no more

Than this - following light and blackbirds, going and staying.





Poetry by countryfog
Read 745 times
Written on 2013-05-19 at 16:42

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Lawrence Beck The PoetBay support member heart!
Beautiful, Fog. I was going to pick out a phrase as my favorite, but the poem is a string of such phrases. Wow.
2013-05-21



I too find comfort in nature's rhythms, so this settles well with me. I haven't lived in any one place for a great number of years, but where I have felt happiest is in country places, able to observe the patterns of trees, flowers, bird. This description of light and blackbirds is very well crafted, and also very moving – applause!
2013-05-20



Yet another piece of perfection... This is amazing.
2013-05-20


shells
The rhythm of life carries your observations to the rest of us, which is lovely. As I age I find repetition in nature sort of comforting and the fact that my children hopefully will see and remember too is also comforting. I'm 22 years living here so far.
2013-05-19