Animal Crackers

SKY RIDER

Solitary sentinal,
a bull elk trumpets
across the thin white vastness,
calling to a red hawk riding
the hot thermals
that swirl up
from cold granite peaks,
dropping and rising,
then bobbing,
asleep
on the soft wind.

A bald eagle
when raspberry runs down
Rainier's ridges,
feathered white crown resplendent
in purple fire,
diving,
diving down for its dinner
in American Lake.

A black crow,
token jokester,
nearly invisible
against the night skyline,
soaring,
soaring high
above the lights of the city,
winging inexorably
toward its special destiny.

A gray gull,
circling the Sound,
searching for the moment
when it will
slice a hole in the dark clouds,
so as to soar unfettered
in the electric blue;
never silent,
its sibilant haunting cry
floated inland.

I heard it clearly,
there
on my hilltop,
always on high
now;
able to stride across skyscrapers,
at one with the glass
and black steel
that thrusts deep
into the bottom of the sky.


Glenn Buttkus 1986