The Flight

I saw the herons trooping across the evening sky And wondered how far their white wings flew What perils neath cosmic clouds their patient path defy What change awaits them none ever knew The call of summer seduces them home, and pastures Here are fair no more; the unknown lures Of long left home, when winter loomed, soft comfort ruptures Each wing changing place the flight endures. She does not yet come though seasons change from fair to foul And the heart each sunset bleats as reeds That whistle and tremble when the wild winching winds howl Hauling bowels up to groan its needs Some magic where the white herons brace against the light To reach, keeps captive too her tired heart Of this world where every day ends with dark callous night And resolves with each sunset depart O then that I were a heron to fly now to you Or else away to some pasture sweet Where Dunstan River keeps flowing like promise true And flowers there beyond our deceit For they do not ask to be loved, but in beauty pure Gave ease to a schoolboy sheltered there While school left him weary with irrelevance and uproar And ever since for solace thought goes there. Where not heron nor faithless love my come, or worst leave A child, like a father's sudden death, In pain, to suffer withering conflicts and to grieve Each sunset, my forever regret The marriage I could not count on making talent king The crablike envy that tore my wings And I late to healing proved nothing by suffering While Dunstan River her comfort sings.