Vultures

Friday Poem
Vulture

I had walked since dawn and lay down to rest on a bare hillside

Above the ocean. I saw through half-shut eyelids a vulture wheeling

.....high up in heaven,

And presently it passed again, but lower and nearer, its orbit

.....narrowing,

.....I understood then

That I was under inspection. I lay death-still and heard the flight-

.....feathers

Whistle above me and make their circle and come nearer.

I could see the naked red head between the great wings

Bear downward staring. I said, "My dear bird, we are wasting time

.....here.

These old bones will still work; they are not for you." But how

.....beautiful

.....he looked, gliding down

On those great sails; how beautiful he looked, veering away in the

.....sea-light

.....over the precipice. I tell you solemnly

That I was sorry to have disappointed him. To be eaten by that beak

.....and

.....become part of him, to share those wings and those eyes--

What a sublime end of one's body, what and enskyment; what a life

.....after death.

by Robinson Jeffers


From 3qd