Falcon Flying High

Falcon flying high

On a backdrop of sapphire sky,

What do you spy

Of the world here below?

What catches your eye

In row upon row

Of engineered surfaces

Static of flow,

With ill-defined purposes?

Forests used to grow,

Here banyan, there birch,

And each you could know

When gliding in search

Of a perch

To consider

The world here below.

 

One of my favorite poetry-related things is when I go out for a walk, and by the time I return, I have a fully-formed (or nearly fully-formed) poem in my head ready to write down. That's how this one came about. I went for a walk today, and a few minutes in, I spotted some birds circling high in the air. This is a common sight here, but it got my wheels turning, nonetheless. They weren't falcons, but a falcon fit well into the language of the poem that was developing. By the time I was climbing the stairs back to my apartment, the last line was coming into my mind.