WEBVTT

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OK, I'm going to do a last poem.

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Another bird poem.

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I don't know why--

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I mean, these I had
written these bird poems,

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and now birds have come
fully into my life.

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I'm about to do a reading
with Kent Nelson, who

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has written a book called
Language in the Blood

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about an ornithologist I
believe set in Arizona.

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And I've taken up doing wildlife
rehabilitation with Project

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Wildlife in San
Diego, and I did this

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because I'd taken a
float on the Missouri

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and writing
something about that,

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and I wanted to be around
pelicans because I'm

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writing about
pelicans, but I had

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to go through my apprenticeship
and there were no pelicans to--

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even though I'm on the Pelican
Rescue Squad I've never gotten

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a call yet to rescue a pelican.

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So what I'm doing
is physical therapy

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with lame ducks, which is
not what this poem is about.

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But anyway, this poem is
about a pileated woodpecker.

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Many winters I spent alone
up at my cabin in Montana,

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and my only companion would
be the pileated woodpecker.

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And the cat that appeared
earlier in this manuscript.

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I went off to Louisiana to
teach and a bunch of writers

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rented my house
and then moved, I

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think, half the writers
of America into my house.

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One of them, Barry
Hannah, who is

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known for his
outlandish behavior,

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and we have a very small
Christmas tree farm,

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and now we have a very
small Christmas tree

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farm that all of
the Christmas trees

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are full of bullet wounds.

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Barry Hannah bullet wounds.

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And during this time
my cat disappeared,

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and the pileated woodpecker
disappeared, and I could only

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speculate as to what happened.

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But after I'd been home
about a month and a half,

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the pileated
woodpecker reappeared

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and I thought that was aside
from the fact it was summer

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solstice, I thought that
was reason for writing

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a poem of celebration.

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So closing poem, "Woodpecker."

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"On the day the poppies
burst their tight green fist

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and the gem and the
geranium bloomed

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all bloody red and ruby, so the
pileated woodpecker returned.

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He ricocheted off the
pine trunk and picking

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among the yellow bugs sped
quickly to the pea vines.

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Fat breasted he
drilled his name,

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then let it drip and trill
around the forest, down

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his throat, landlord of
the mountain, mafioso

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in a tweed vest, red
crested wail of the sky,

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he announced the
summer solstice.

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And we ran to the window
knowing that the last snow would

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melt on the bitter roots
to flood our fields,

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knowing it was time
for aurora borealis,

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heaven's beast, her
tentacles flicking

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like jellyfish on the
shortest night of the year.

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And we did the dance of the
woodpecker, the fat flicker,

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the pagan priest.

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When the clover bloom the
salsify and wild roses

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and we knew that
winter was over.

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We did the dance of
the smart, hard headed,

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flashy creatures of the world.

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After all, in summer, when
blood is thick and dark

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as the flicker's crest,
when we might all

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fatten on berries
and weeds alone,

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isn't there room for each
of us, even the greedy ones?

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After all, have you never
wanted to drive at top speed

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to slam into a tree
or dive from a ledge

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or catch fire or slit your
wrist and let the fluids geyser?

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Not suicide, but
it's burning, not

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rage directed at humankind, no,
the heart remains a sweet berry

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and ripe.

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But red drives the stickleback,
wild red small spots

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among the green,
among the brown rocks,

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and so on the long day of
the summer solstice when

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the world spins
silly with light,

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we do the dance
of the woodpecker,

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twirling our skirts
and mustaches,

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tapping our resonant
branches, our underwear

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flashing white as we shake the
irregular flags of our body

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into undulant raw flight."

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Thank you.

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[APPLAUSE]

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