Her Longing

Before this longing,
I lived serene as a fish,
At one with the plants in the pond,
The mare’s tail, the floating frogbit.
Among my eight-legged friends,
Open like a pool, a lesser parsnip,
Like a leech, looping myself along,
A bug-eyed edible one,
A mouth like a stickleback —
O a thing quiescent!

But now —
The wild stream, the sea itself cannot contain me:
I dive with the black hag, the cormorant,
Or walk the pebbly shore with the humpbacked heron,
Shaking out my catch in the morning sunlight,
Or rise with the gar eagle, the great-winged condor,
Floating over the mountains,
Pitting my breast against the rushing air‚
A phoenix, sure of my body,
Perpetually rising out of myself,
My wings hovering over the shorebirds,
Or beating against the black clouds of the storm,
Protecting the sea cliffs.