Orioling

You love their singing—the thrush, the orioles—
   though they don't perform for you. Theirs is a clan
song: My bugs, my bough, my mate, and:
   See how bright the orange and black of my feathers.
Nor do they sing for blighted love and the hard
   blues of loss we would, or for joy,
but because they can't help it, because song
   blossoms from the stem of their being bird.
Human, you can't help trying to understand
   what stalk you flower from, what undertow
rises in the flutist to quicken with breath
   the arcs and dips of prior minds, or mind
itself, playing with fugue, with E=MC²,
   inventing wheel, organ, flute, B Minor Mass—
Buddha—the bomb. The song you bear buds
   under your mind's tongue like a first word.

Copyright © 2003 Ann Silsbee All rights reserved
from Orioling
Red Hen Press
Reprinted by Verse Daily® with permission