by Mark Jackley

                                             For K

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The heron is heaven-sent,

but the vulture has the widest

wing-span to encompass

heaven. On his way

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to heaven, my dad, mostly blind,

would shuffle to the john.

Seeing only fog, he walked into fog.

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Last night, asleep, I searched

for you in flickering woods and dreamt

a Braille of wet pine needles

on bare feet.

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AS THE SUN RISES

by Mark Jackley

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Reading in the car

by a pond. Short poems

of Anna Swir, small potatoes

from the Polish earth.

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A little dirt clings to them,

stubbornly, like truth—

tang of something mineral,

from below the surface.

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I lean in, a villager

starved for news. Someone,

across a tavern table,

shares.

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I DREAM WHEN I AM OLD

I BECOME A GREAT BLUE HERON

by Mark Jackley

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Not for the first time,

I step out of my body

gingerly to wade

into the black water

of the Great Peace,

to stand in feathery silence

in the One Moment, under

snowy, leaking stars,

and to flap my wings,

slow wet loving muscles

shuddering as the cold, delicious

air inhales me.