1. OWL SONG

low –
out from the gray-green backs of trees,
spreading out as darkness into hillsides –

in silence, the fog –
its longing somewhere to be anchored –

what has traveled nearly
an entire lifetime to reach us


2. CALL

She says her name is Sky.
She says,
on cold, sharp-shivered branches,
you can hear her call
coming up from the woods at night.
The wind takes its sound and shapes it
over the mountain,
protecting it.
Night is whole, she says,
untangled,
with the direction of the fog.
(There is a need to wander).
For things done, for things left undone, she says,
her version of it, prayerful,
wades through branches –
the swift, the shaded of it
the way very deep black is always taking,
choosing something of the mountain
to cling to,
to fall on fiercely
as water,
as force.


3. OWL SKETCH

You –

Swiftly behind tree or shadow
glide down steeply,
spreading out as darkness into hillsides.

In silence, as fog,
you hunt the edges.

I trace you winged and solitary,
gray against a blue-black sky.

In the ink of twilight: a rush of feathers –

How easily you vanish.



Words and image by Sarah Rehfeldt. Please do not copy without my permission.

"Owl Song" published in Written River Journal of Eco-Poetics, issue 10 (2016), reprinted in Clementine Poetry Journal (Sept. 2015).
"Call" with image published in Seven CirclePress / CircleShow, vol. 12 (Summer 2015).
"Owl Sketch" selected by City of Edmonds, WA to be a part of 2024 Poet's Perspective.