Читать книгу The Heronry - Mark Jarman - Страница 10

Catch and Release

By the scientist’s front door

an azalea, memento

of a term in college catching

field mice under redwoods among

azaleas, to study traits

of families, their range among

azaleas. Now she has one

flowering yearly by her front door.

Pressure of the lab, of funding

overheads and uncommitted

assistants, yet the azalea

greets her every day, a memory

tangled in it like cobweb mist

of doing a simple task

repeatedly, under the redwoods

with the Havahart traps, then in

the clean lit lab. Simplicity,

youth, one or two obligations,

their emblem the azalea.

And the release, gray and silver

quickness in the undergrowth,

to hunting, breeding, hunger—

the speed of life.