Rebecca Hawkes, In the dawn sings a fierce chorus, 2023
Oils on canvas
Courtesy of the artist
Artist Website, Instagram
Where are they now?—the darling birds, fallen
from shaken oak, from slip-stream sky,
fallen from first-flight, first-light, dusk-mouthed
& tumbling. Those years, wasn’t I some kind of girlish-
monster? Just wanted a little heart beating, a little
heat in my hands. So many—towhee, junco, one
then the other. I thought them meant for me.
She must have slipped, I’d say, running home
for a shoebox, forgotten by her mother. She must need
a mother, I’d say. I will love her—my delicious dolly
dropped in cool moonlight—broken-wing, crooked
beak, fit for my cupped palm. Maybe this one
will stay, I’d think, as I held the dropper,
maybe she’ll perch on my shoulder—feathered
progeny. All morning afternoon evening I would watch
my abandoned daughter, her thumb-sized
cheek her feather-wisp, each strand a stitch
looping sky into the place I was most
lonely. Don’t go—I’d cry, my little persimmon,
my little drop of honey, when her breath
ceased. I was almost one of them, moth-winged
& floating in my cotton dress, early practiced
at whispering in mother-nymph, healer to any broken
darling, each a wonder, each soft back smelling
of cut grass & damp oak. I need a mother, I dared
not say—sad little slip-shadow, her light my light, being
so round, so close I could touch her black eye
with my eye—silent pond from where
she’d fallen. What delight to stroke her curved &
silky head, my sky-minnow—first time I touched
a miracle. Now, older
I’ve learned to be more careful, mind the perimeter
of any other. Everything I know about love
I learned from robin, sparrow—the one
I found breathless under a fat juniper,
my own heart quickening.