Passing Through the Shadow of the Earth
Jonathan Skinner
ebb tide dropping the river
frog leaps from the mud
greased stone I step on
kingfisher starlings red-winged blackbirds
heron beginning
paddle digs in along kayak
flanks sending upriver
low blinding light puts
you swiftly in shadows
cresting through the chop
wind against current
kingfisher clicks
ahead, on a branch, restless
darts around the bend
figure eights
wings fanned a moment
making a bow
wind in the trees
these still woods, growing moss
exhale at the tide going out
eyes green blue obsidian look out
up or down searching
for knowledge in our bodies
which know nothing
but what they know
they know well, are satisfied
with so much less
what the turtle knows
estivating in mud
the snake propelling its slight
snout along the surface
the butterfly tumbling in a gust
the hawk lofting and aiming
its deadly sternum
all things turn, flash, catch
in the mind a moment
we pass through shadows
we do not know lie on us
degrees of penumbral
influence
the earth and moist part
of plants blown over us
by the hot, drying wind
people say the planet is dying
it is we who are dying
hungry for life we put the earth
inside of us
we want it to pass through
the gate of dispossession
this not owning what we are
being surprised the way
touch answers touch
on its own terms
the way a cloud expands
contracts, turns
blackbirds synchronized
opening their ranks
not fixated, meandering
always a movement away from
and a return
to places, persons
we come to love with particulars
not of the past
but ongoing
lifted from yet immersed in
a change that does not change
knowledge of what does not die
until we do
the heron steers slowly
out of long river grasses
legs trailing, squawks
disappears
doves cooing
under bridge rafters
as I haul myself out, remove
sandals step into the thick
clay of the bank
pull the kayak up
over mud and grass
where the road crosses
at a bend in the river
~~~~~
Jonathan Skinner founded the journal ecopoetics. His books include Chip Calls (Little Red Leaves, 2014), Birds of Tifft (BlazeVOX, 2011), Warblers (Albion, 2010) and Political Cactus Poems (Palm Press, 2005). He teaches in the Department of English and Comparative Literary Studies at the University of Warwick.