A Common Bird

Artist: Ben Houstie, Wood Duck 1996

A common bird
Seen for the first time
Heard for the first time
Seems anything but common
As we hurry its smouldering image
Sealed in the thin paper
Of an undisciplined mind
Back to our study

Often urged by need
I compare its image
To flat pictures
In a favorite book
Thumbed through
A thousand times before

So wanting to exist
So needing to be found
That image
Would even change
Its essence, its truth
Just to match
One photo in the book
And to live in that
And then
Be lost to that

As the bird flew
And I walked
Beyond our greeting
It was too late
To know that bird

Just as an image
For I saw it
And I felt it
Both of us open

In that instant