A Vulture’s Love Is True

Too few can stare into the sun,
Can find the clear wet stream.
A desert dweller’s noontime nap
Is no dream captured clean.
Though shadows hide, no hope to cool,
Your moans kiss broken bones.

I caught my breath when you confessed
That you love vultures, too.

Alone I thought my hike would be,
Slow way picked over rock.
Soiled tee, skinned knee, empty canteen,
Your tent was not mirage.
Smoked stars sent flares none else would see
Behind clouds still as church
No one had locked, lit candles fumed:
A sentry calls me home.

I caught my breath when you confessed
That you love vultures, too.

Our flesh has got to find its way
To make a clean escape.
The gulch and mesa might keep place,
Arroyo, plateau must go.
Quail will flush in pairs, it seems,
To confound coyotes’ bites.

You caught your breath when I confessed
A vulture’s love is true.

* * *

This is a bop. A bop! (A drafty draft, but still a bop.) Christine gave the Read Write Poem community a great prompt, based on a poem style she picked up at a poetry reading. Folks left 2-lines in the comments for others to use in their poems. I had to try it out and  borrowed the refrain from James. (Thanks, James. Who is also a bird guy and is recently featured on Postal Poetry.)

I had no idea where this would go, at all. None. Nada.

But James’ refrain (which captured me straight away) had such a strong iambic pulse I felt compelled – for good or ill – to keep it going. I tried to develop an 8-beat/6-beat couplet. I don’t believe I have tried iambic meter since I was 14 (and let’s just say that was a long, long time ago). It was fun for me to write, and I hope it’s fun for you to read.

As to the matter of vultures: That was a natural. I like them. I really do. And I had had a relatively recent Identi.ca conversation with a fellow about them. (What’s-a-vulture vs. what’s-a-buzzard discussion.) So it seemed I was destined to write about vultures. (Or buzzards, or even storks; because some vultures are actually from the stork family!)

For more examples of the bop, go here.