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| "Cerunnos" |
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| E. A. Hanninen - 2006 |
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Ganier Ridge Trail— 4/23/92
I.
Hickories overhead
I saw the warrior for your love again
Antlers on his head
There was light in his eyes
but it only changed the color
of the things he happened to see
Human fear surely fades
above these tree lines
A cricket-song
layer
of foregone
narratives, ears
as if they
were butterflies,
would do well
to bounce
back above
every time
they dipped
under
II.
I lay on Ganier Ridge
thick paperback of Shakespeare's sonnets
my pillow
Things I should be doing
at the office
claw my back muscles,
jostle to climb above
one another on the priority list of why I shouldn't
be here: inversion
of what it feels like to read Emily.
I walk on the trail toward the lake, see
a woman with binoculars
and a small book
beside the trail What do you hear?
I ask. A White-Eyed
Vireo, she says. It's that one
her eyes point toward
air, toward one pattern
among a thousand-acre songscape full
of chirping whooping trilling whistling
clucking hooting. I nod
—don't mention my mind overloaded at once
trying to list the songs she might mean—
then just breathe there in that space
the unnamed musics cleared
under the tree line.
III.
Under the tree line
a goose walks on purplish
webbing that looks like a cross
between skin and toenail—
powerful blood-leather—
there's no fear in its black eye
Black school
of martins skim over the lake
circling in a dance—
they change leaders according to some complicated
pattern that never confuses, a dance after mosquitoes;
after mosquitoes they climb but stay under
the tree line.
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Lavetta Swift Bench— 2/3/99
I'm told the Cherokee name for Radnor Lake —Oohlungwodee Oohnolay—
can be translated, the wind is sacred there
The wind is sacred—
an expression
mighty and moody—
it brushes
our faces
with such variety Expression
from something that says nothing
more clearly
to us
Of all things outside us nothing anywhere says
anything more clearly: wind on cheek
Words, even Cherokee words, are moons
of truth, not suns of truth, so
we keep forgetting that the wind is sacred
and this is good because
discovery is needed
to fan our spirit skin fresh again
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Klyd Watkins has four grown sons, good men all, and a growing bunch of grandkids. He began writing poetry in the late 60's,
publishing in little magazines of the day like Poem (still around) and Red Clay Reader. Then he switched to
making poetry by recording it directly onto tape, often in simultaneous improvisation with other poets. Klyd now both records
and writes poetry, depending on one to feed the other. His latest chapbook, 5 Speed, is from The Temple. He also has new
Spoken Poem CD out, Harp All Made of Gold, produced by Thundershack.
Contact Klyd
CD
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