Sometimes a Feather Will Drop From the Sky

On the edge of drifting into dream,
at 2 a.m., Wild Woman heard a voice
and woke back up:

Sometimes a pathway, 
a direction, is shown.
Listen to the animals;
they will show the way.
Even the green growing things
are speaking.

Sometimes a feather
will drop from the sky.
Treat it with honour
and it will lend you
its wings.

The Birds of Waaxp̓inč̓a

Late spring evening, 

a thousand turnstones sing
across the harbour
on what we mamalthni**
call Neilsen Island.
The First Peoples of this land
have always known it 
as Waaxp̓inč̓a*,
island of the river otters.

The birds converse
in their ancient tongue.
The Nuu chah nulth say
there was a time
when human and animal
plant and tree
spoke to each other
in the same language.
It is we mamalthni
who have forgotten.
But the living land and water
cedar and osprey
orca, wolf and bear
must carry this wisdom
of interconnection
in cellular memory.

In counterpoint
upon the moment’s rapture,
a boat motor roars;
a seaplane flies in, low:
we humans, being –
our cacophony and clamour,
our relentless encroachment
on the wild -
the thousand singing voices
falling suddenly silent.

**Mamalthni is the Nuu chah nulth word for white people

* Waaxp̓inč̓a  means island of the river otters

This poem is part of the Sound Range Project: Poetry of a Soundscape, envisioned and brought to life by Tofino Poet Laureate Joanna Streetly. The project pairs poems, recorded sounds, and the language of the Nuu chah nulth people into an interactive map of Clayoquot Sound.

Click here to visit Sound Range: Poetry of a Soundscape

Believe

"Believe in your dreams!" Wild Woman told her childen.
"Believe in life, in nature, in Mother Earth,"
she told her friends.
"Believe in the transformation of consciousness,
in the goodness of humanity,
that we will change in time," she wrote in poems.
By now, she was sounding  a bit shrill and desperate.

Now, everything has changed.
Turns out the warnings were right;
but now we are reacting to disasters,
rather than making change to prevent them.

A bit late for raised consciousness,
but better late than never.

Her heart lifts as humans rise to meet the challenge.
It sinks as capitalism re-opens
its voracious maw to gobble More.

"Do we learn nothing?" she asks the walls, redundantly.

"Believe!" says the stone on her desk,
catching her eye, refusing
to let her fall into despair.

"I'll try," replies Wild Woman.
At this point, she will take encouragement
even from a stone.


for Day 18 at Real Toads: Encouragement

and for Earthweal: the Crossroads

Watch for Me, a Sandpiper at the Edge of the Sea

Wickaninnish in blue

Dear Ones,
I will return to the shores
of Wickaninnish,
roiling in winter storm.
I shall come back to watch
the morning break
against blue sky and rose-tinged 

puffy cloud,

to see all the creatures 

stir and waken,

and the day unfold.

I shall return to gaze in wonder,

at the end of day,

as the sun sinks, purple, azure, gold,

below the horizon,

and the skies become a masterpiece

painted by God.

I may return as a seabird,

as Jonathan, 

still outside of the pack, observing, 

still hobbling on the ground

and dreaming of the sky.

I'll pick a shell in my beak 

and carry it off to my perch,

then drop it,

deep in the forest,

for a wanderer to find, 

and marvel at, years hence.

Or I might be a sandpiper, 

one of the flock,

lifting and turning together

as one body, at the edge of the sea.

How could my spirit not return

to the forests and rivers and ocean I love,

to catch my breath once more 

as the morning mist

drapes itself companionably 

across Lone Cone,

to behold once more her slopes 

turning deepest rose

in late afternoon?

The call of the murmurous, forever waves,

the smell of salt, kelp and seaweed,

ocean essence will draw me, 

as before,

to the beautiful shore.

I might return, briefly,

once again young, 

for the smell of peony

on soft-scented summer evenings,

for a shy, youthful kiss 

under weeping willow,

lake ripples lapping gently,

and all of life's hopes and dreams 

lying ahead,

all golden and shining.

I will return for apple blossoms, 

and the smell of sage and Ponderosa pine
on hot, dusty hills

covered with yellow flowers.

But then the shore will draw me back,

as it always did,

the blue sky drawing my gaze 

as it did for

all my many years.

I will heed the call

of the ancient trees, 

where restless spirits live,

their mournful song whispering 

secrets and wisdom -

urgent truth for us to hear and heed,

if we but listen.

If I don't return in body,

I will return as raindrops on salal,

as moss on an old stump,

or old man's beard on cedar.

I will return

in wagging puppy-tails 

and wise old elephant eyes,

or a grey whale, diving, 

its fluted tail arching over and up,

then slipping down, down, 

into the mysterious depths.

Watch the world with wonder,

as I have these many years,

and you'll find me, 

never farther away than

the nearest beautiful thing.

A poem from 2016  for Earthweal's Open Link.

Clayoquot Sound Haiku

copyright Gaby Harig

Wolf Spirit, your call
from your misty mountain lair
sends my soul keening

***

footprints in the sand
my heart follows where they lead
till I'm home again

***

bonsai in the bog
a little touch of Asia
in Clayoquot Sound

***


for Day 17 at Real Toads: Exploring Nature's Wonders - Haiku

Wild Woman and Black Puppies

Wild Woman is blindsided
by a small black puppy in a movie,
remembering that small black pup
that grew into a big black wolf:
alpha,
hilarious,
intelligent,
totally his own wild being
- and the love of her life.

Almost ten years,
since he died,
and a small black puppy
that will grow big,
grow old,
and die
still brings her to tears.

Wild Woman Knows What She Knows

source

Wild Woman made a journey
into the future, into the remains
of a world where all beings
have been finally deemed equal
in our capacity to suffer and die from
a deadly virus.

She saw two screens,
where future life was
playing out.

In one, the global wildlife trade
had stopped, wet markets and
factory farms had closed.
Animals were granted respect
and lives free of abuse,
as were all humans.
Humanity had changed the way
we live on Mother Earth.
She was beginning to heal.

On the other screen,
were wars and great suffering,
rampant disease and death
from hundreds of pandemics
unleashed by cruel practices,
 a world of rapacious greed,
extreme poverty and suffering,
a world choking on its own fumes,
a beautiful garden turned into
a human-created hell.

Wild Woman woke up
before she saw which path we chose.
She has no answer to that question;
she only knows what she knows,
and she'll share her wisdom well
before she goes.


Experts are saying the corona virus will still be around (the same as influenza) even after we flatten the curve and develop a vaccine. They also say more pandemics are waiting to be unleashed in the places where animals are cruelly caged, slaughtered and "processed" into food. (In North America, our factory "farms" are as damning as what we cluck about overseas. Hundreds of workers in those facilities are testing positive for covid.) Ancient viruses are also waking up in the north, where the tundra where they are stored is melting. This virus is our biggest sign yet that global change is needed in how we live on earth. Huge change. We need visionary leaders.  We need to heed the experts, and our own inner wisdom.

for Day 16 at Real Toads: In the Remains