shots ring out!

the valley ricochets the gun shots..
banged and popped by the hunters of ducks..geese..

it is not an easy sound..
not like the mooing of the nearby cows
nor the wide awake howls of coyote moon bashes
nor the magic dialect of the raven's flight path
or the whiz & click & bizbuzz of the hummers at the feeders ~
it shocks one into an o my goodness !
where is the goodness in this crashbangboom?
it eludes me..

i thought i heard a wounded cry of a winged one..
twanged and tinged with a bullet
that did not bring it down to earth..
a ragged song that had lost the full vitality of voice..
over and over and over and out..

i had written a post
LAMENT some years back..
(on all soul's day)
here it is again..
the sentiment the same..

my mate..
my mate for life has gone..
gone the way of the deceiver's call
in the early soggy wet of duck morning..
though he has offered his shimmer feathers
his meat
his wing
for the nourishment of another -
        & i praise him for that..i do..
my mate for life
is gone


( what the hen must feel
when her drake does not return..?
we humanoids say that animals /birds/ insects
are not the feeling type..
how is it we know this?

i look at the yes of a bird,
the eyes
and i am seeing back to myself.. )

yes..we are feeling..
our small hearts skip a beat..
the weighty life of loss
makes our wings burdensome ~
flight is not a soaring
with our true companion gone..

i know this ..
i know this from my own wing ~
my own lonely wing..


exaltation for all souls all saints
all ducks & all hunters of ducks