12_tidal

ABOVE THE RIVER’S TIDAL WATER

I had read of swans, of course, and could recite their names:
the Mute, Bewick and the Whooper. I knew their habitats:
inland reservoirs, pastoral meadows, meandering rivers,

suburban shallows. That they were protected by provenance
and law I also knew, but I disliked their frigid elegance,
their studied gliding movements, their balletic stance.

The calm display of their choreography invited metaphors
of status without power, taste without prophecy: icons
for heraldic shields, emblems for mugs, scenes for jigsaws –

and then I saw the swan above the river’s tidal water,
a prodigy of driven white, its huge wings whirring over
my astounded head, its webbed feet dripping silver

in the mist and light. No beginning, no middle, no end.
Not a word on my tongue…Mysterium Tremendum.