APRIL PROMPTS #9
David #4: Your secret name, or real name, or secret identity
WHO AM I NOW
It has to do with the birds who come to the feeder
outside my study window every morning and the birds
who meet me in the forest and feed from my hand.
And the water that drips from the eaves
and the water that flows in the channel
under the log bridge between the low banks
on the east side of the garden. The old oak tree
and her squirrel- planted children.
All the different mosses on tree trunks and stones
with their lancelet or oval or hairlike leaves
and the small insects living between their branches.
Opossum tracks and bobcat tracks and fox tracks
and coyote tracks and crow tracks and turkey tracks
and the tracks of the stray cat around the garage.
The way clouds dissipate or grow. Planets
wandering along the ecliptic. The nebula
in Orion, and the star cluster in Hercules
and the stories about Orion and Hercules
and Persephone and Artemis and One-Eye
Two-Eyes and Three-Eyes and Briar Rose.
The stories about Elijah and Jesus. Stories
about my grandmother, my father, neighbors.
The people I overhear in berry patches
and on the street. My husband and son.
My friends. And you, too. Definitely you.
