Heron
High priest of mud
lord of silt and shallows
you ritualise with stillness
stir of wind and water
engrave the random with solemnity.
Through film of cloud and sun
you stare
past your own gaunt image
scanning plumes of sand
that bloom around your sunken toes.
At last your snake-neck strikes
stabs down
tube of muscle
welded to a sharp barbaric beak.
Flash of wriggling silver
feeling of a thin high scream
then hinges open
and the supple peristaltic neck
implodes upon its prey.
Seeing me
you rise
ancient gallows taking wing
utter an indignant rusty “cronk”
and flap across the waves
your shadow trailing
like an unacknowledged ancestor.