Elephants
Last of the great herds
The ultimate gardeners
Till with massive feet
Fox Cubs
Playing in the dawn
Rehearsing the greater game
Of life, struggle, death.
Racoon
Racoons parading
Clever young in line behind
Deft hands, eager brains
Snowy Owl
Winter storm of life
Fiery guardian of her eggs
Sits still as death
Orange-kneed Tarantula
For him, adventure
Quests across the forest floor
A male stereotype
For her a cavern
Filled by her startling beauty:
She sits, guards, waits
The species evolved
Over untold millennia -
Hail, Costa Rica!
Glory of the clouds!
The deep time of the forest
Stirred by coming change
Elf Owl
Parliaments of elfs
Would be Ruritanian -
Almost unnoticed
But the meek inherit
Playing dead is survival
And if they look back
Blood pools in the brain:
They have such small bird tricks
To keep them going
"Dignity" might be
A better noun - a "Dignity"
Of tiny, perfect owls
Common Grackle (Written on St. Valentine's Day)
Symphony of purples
Subtly shading into black:
Such elegant tones
Pure understatement!
Their calls and behaviour
Are far less subdued.
Does that rich plumage,
A semiotics feast of code
Liven grackle hearts ?
Camels
(They say a camel’s
A horse designed by a committee
But I might say a horse
Is a camel designed by the same group
Who forgot to factor in the slow internal release of water)
(In the Bestiary)
Where do camels belong?
By the millions with us
Lords of arid places
Plodders and racers -
We’ve made them ships, race-horses
Beauties in our eyes
Too easy answers:
Water in those humps?
They spit in our eyes!
Centuries of trade routes
Caravans of precious goods
Most precious: culture
All in an eyeblink
Compared with that long epoch
Of perfect wildness,
The trials and errors
Stochastic percentages
Of changing climate
The savage seasons
Probed, tested blood and sinew
Left the wind-picked bones
Way out in the Gobi
The Bactrian survivors
No wild Dromedaries
Delicate cousins
On cold Andean slopes
Skittishly survive
Yet into the dry
Of the endless interior
Of Australia
Camels have escaped
Planted their wild imprint far
From human control
Thylacine (Tasmanian Wolf or tiger)
Tiger-wolf padding
Softly the fearful night paths
Yesterday's terror
Ghostly exists now
In the vaults of old pictures
Catalogues of death
Alfred, Lord Tennyson - 1809-1892
Below the thunders of the upper deep,
Far, far beneath in the abysmal sea,
His ancient, dreamless, uninvaded sleep
The Kraken sleepeth: faintest sunlights flee
About his shadowy sides; above him swell
Huge sponges of millennial growth and height;
And far away into the sickly light,
From many a wondrous grot and secret cell
Unnumbered and enormous polypi
Winnow with giant arms the slumbering green.
There hath he lain for ages, and will lie
Battening upon huge sea worms in his sleep,
Until the latter fire shall heat the deep;
Then once by man and angels to be seen,
In roaring he shall rise and on the surface die.
40.
Samburu (Elephants) by Karen McCall
Drinking chai tea
one night while camping in Kenya
I snap to attention
as roots groan,
bark shreds,
branches crack.
A small herd of elephants
pads softly near my tent,
tearing at trees
in search of food.
Adults rumble amiably and
snuffle up leaves.
A little one squeals.
I close my eyes
to fully savor the presence of this gentle sorority--
when the matriarch booms a thunderous growl
that jerks my rag-doll body
into the air.
Upon landing,
I rearrange my limbs
and regain my composure.
Nerves soothed,
drama complete.
Trusting, that the elephants trust me,
I fall asleep to the lullaby
of their, now quiet, feasting.
I rise with the sun
to a chorus of snoring and farting.
Next to my tent
five leathery mountains,
three adults two calves,
lie curled on their sides asleep.
The sixth elephant stands silently
guarding her family.
She must have seen or heard me
because the group floats to their feet in an instant.
And —
what a trick—
these giants vanish
like smoke.
All night long we had slept
next to each other
commingling breath,
dreaming of a new world built of grass and sky
where the Messiah is a mother.
Karen McCall
April 28, 2019
41.
Howler Monkeys - by Karen McCall
In darkness, before
sun swallows night,
male Howler monkeys rumble-roar from tropical tree tops.
Then quiet
covers the forest.
Quiet
quiet
quiet…
Until,
an alpha male
once more
thunder-growls his warning to all potential rivals—
constructing castle walls
with sound
42.
Gray Encounter (Grsy Whales)
By Karen McCall
Sea spray
bearing the tang of kelp and crustaceans
stings my face in the early light
as we skim across the surface
of the lagoon.
I am watching gray whales
feast and frolic
in the kiwi-colored shallows
of Magdalena Bay
when a cow-calf pair approaches our skiff.
The younger whale, only weeks old,
dwarfs our small boat.
His smooth elastic skin,
fresh from the shelter of his mother’s womb,
is already buttoned with barnacles.
Next to our bow,
he lifts his rostrum
out of the water
in friendly greeting.
His curious eye looks directly into mine
inviting my touch.
Before I stretch my fingers over the gunnels
to caress that infant cheek
Before the baby whale closes his eye in pleasure
at my touch
Before we linger
together like this
for a long part of an hou
His mother dives below
our panga and
lifts our boat a few inches higher in the sea.
We rise on her back,
emerging like an island from the brine.
She calculates
and pauses,
before
gently
letting
us
go.
43.
Raising Butterflies
By Karen McCall
In the dry aquarium in my kitchen,
a caterpillar
convulses with the promise of wings.
Parsley and milkweed within glass walls
create a small Eden
where fat fleshy cylinders feast,
then bubble out of old, too-tight skins
sending Monarchs, Painted Ladies, Black Swallowtails
into a transformative sleep.
In their final disrobing,
Monarch larvae leave behind
translucent, jade-green jewels
suspended from branches upon which
they once flexed and fed.
Their chrysalids store
a viscous caterpillar soup
that will morph into patterned, papery wings
designed to soar across seas.
On this morning,
one chrysalis darkens and trembles in contractions.
Green skin tears away
as twitching antennae emerge,
probing the alien air.
I midwife these birth-soaked butterflies
outdoors to cure in the sun.
The heat lifts them in the sky--
a confetti of wings.
44.
On The Edge - Tamarins
Their long tails flowing
Parabolas their paths of air
Stitching earth to sky
In the sweeping world
The trees on the edge of death
As if immortal
Eye to eye and face
To face the tamarins meet
The aspect of eternity