"WETLAND" BY JOHN DONLAN

"Potato chip, potato chip," goldfinches
lilt over the beaver dam, "just givin' 'er,"
downstream the little waterfall
pours loveliness unstintingly,

sulfur-brilliant, whitely falling saviours.
Leopard frog, happy and rich like me
on the muddy margins, your perfect
meditation soothes this venomous mood,

forgives my bloody boyhood ignorant
as dirt, stoning your kin.
May money and law
serve and protect our vulnerable cathedral

flimsy as any moss or dragonfly
wing, dear as a spouse's body loved
lifelong, freely giving, deepening us
out of our tiny knowing; keep it so.

3 September 2003


	Wetland