{"id":4303,"date":"2018-08-24T09:12:06","date_gmt":"2018-08-24T16:12:06","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.nestuccaspitpress.com\/blog\/?p=4303"},"modified":"2020-06-21T18:52:11","modified_gmt":"2020-06-22T01:52:11","slug":"swallows-garage-poem-2007","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.nestuccaspitpress.com\/blog\/meditations\/swallows-garage-poem-2007\/","title":{"rendered":"Swallows In My Garage–A Poem (2007)"},"content":{"rendered":"

\n

For the third or fourth<\/span><\/p>\n

dusk in a row,<\/span><\/p>\n

the thirty to forty<\/span><\/p>\n

that live in my garage<\/span><\/p>\n

mass on the power line,<\/span><\/p>\n

joining others from the refuge,<\/span><\/p>\n

one hundred to two hundred strong,<\/span><\/p>\n

doing what swallows do<\/span><\/p>\n

before they fly south<\/span><\/p>\n

to escape the Oregon Coast<\/span><\/p>\n

winter rain<\/span><\/p>\n

that drove Meriwether Lewis insane.<\/span><\/p>\n

Reclined on the lawn,<\/span><\/p>\n

I watch them,<\/span><\/p>\n

not knowing<\/span><\/p>\n

if the third or fourth dusk<\/span><\/p>\n

will end the season<\/span><\/p>\n

of my swallows,<\/span><\/p>\n

until they return<\/span><\/p>\n

next spring,<\/span><\/p>\n

from Mexico.<\/span><\/p>\n

They mass, they prepare.<\/span><\/p>\n

I do not want them to leave<\/span><\/p>\n

and not because when they leave<\/span><\/p>\n

I know summer has flown.<\/span><\/p>\n

In April there was one,<\/span><\/p>\n

then two,<\/span><\/p>\n

then three scouts appeared.<\/span><\/p>\n

A week later,<\/span><\/p>\n

the couples arrived,<\/span><\/p>\n

again,<\/span><\/p>\n

to the very nests<\/span><\/p>\n

they made years ago,<\/span><\/p>\n

made from mud, twigs<\/span><\/p>\n

and dryer lint.<\/span><\/p>\n

Some did not return.<\/span><\/p>\n

I know who they were,<\/span><\/p>\n

and how each flew<\/span><\/p>\n

unique in flight,<\/span><\/p>\n

diving<\/span><\/p>\n

near my head,<\/span><\/p>\n

a certain Kamikaze<\/span><\/p>\n

kind of flight, <\/span><\/p>\n

a beautiful <\/span><\/p>\n

menacing flight<\/span><\/p>\n

that awoke everything in me.<\/span><\/p>\n

They never hit me,<\/span><\/p>\n

or crashed,<\/span><\/p>\n

or peppered me,<\/span><\/p>\n

although<\/span><\/p>\n

they shotgunned<\/span><\/p>\n

my garage<\/span><\/p>\n

with so much white<\/span><\/p>\n

that I must park<\/span><\/p>\n

the truck outside<\/span><\/p>\n

from April to August.<\/span><\/p>\n

It\u2019s a small price to pay.<\/span><\/p>\n

I know my swallows<\/span><\/p>\n

understand<\/span><\/p>\n

no such thing<\/span><\/p>\n

as reciprocity,<\/span><\/p>\n

but they have become<\/span><\/p>\n

my sublime<\/span><\/p>\n

mosquito-eating machine,<\/span><\/p>\n

the most perfect<\/span><\/p>\n

pesticide,<\/span><\/p>\n

that has always been<\/span><\/p>\n

here under the sun.<\/span><\/p>\n

but in this case,<\/span><\/p>\n

the moon.<\/span><\/p>\n

I leave the garage door<\/span><\/p>\n

open all the time<\/span><\/p>\n

for my swallows,<\/span><\/p>\n

and the window too,<\/span><\/p>\n

and I tack boxes<\/span><\/p>\n

below the nests<\/span><\/p>\n

to catch the droppings.<\/span><\/p>\n

The real show begins<\/span><\/p>\n

when the eggs hatch,<\/span><\/p>\n

and the four or five chicks<\/span><\/p>\n

from each of the six nests,<\/span><\/p>\n

launch their lives<\/span><\/p>\n

as swallows<\/span><\/p>\n

in my garage.<\/span><\/p>\n

What wildness it is!<\/span><\/p>\n

A tabernacle<\/span><\/p>\n

of nature<\/span><\/p>\n

with<\/span><\/p>\n

all the water<\/span><\/p>\n

humans need<\/span><\/p>\n

to douse<\/span><\/p>\n

their world on fire<\/span><\/p>\n

is there.<\/span><\/p>\n

All the answers<\/span><\/p>\n

to avoid answering<\/span><\/p>\n

the question:<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cWhat color is it<\/span><\/p>\n

when black is burned?\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

are revealed.<\/span><\/p>\n

It is so obvious,<\/span><\/p>\n

that I, <\/span><\/p>\n

in passing by,<\/span><\/p>\n

conscious of<\/span><\/p>\n

the swallows\u2019 nests<\/span><\/p>\n

in my garage,<\/span><\/p>\n

saw Great Nature\u2019s Face,<\/span><\/p>\n

and did not <\/span><\/p>\n

let it pass<\/span><\/p>\n

infinite by me.<\/span><\/p>\n

I know nothing of<\/span><\/p>\n

swallow biology<\/span><\/p>\n

except they<\/span><\/p>\n

mate for life.<\/span><\/p>\n

There\u2019s pleasure<\/span><\/p>\n

in not knowing more,<\/span><\/p>\n

the writer\u2019s arcane of it all,<\/span><\/p>\n

the Annie Dillard<\/span><\/p>\n

the John McPhee,<\/span><\/p>\n

noticing something <\/span><\/p>\n

to death,<\/span><\/p>\n

or worse,<\/span><\/p>\n

to the point of<\/span><\/p>\n

no mystery.<\/span><\/p>\n

Cindy once said,<\/span><\/p>\n

on our walk<\/span><\/p>\n

on the refuge,<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cJust stop talking<\/span><\/p>\n

about nature and<\/span><\/p>\n

let it be<\/span><\/p>\n

without you.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

She is gone from our home<\/span><\/p>\n

but the swallows return.<\/span><\/p>\n

We used to talk to them together.<\/span><\/p>\n

I wake them,<\/span><\/p>\n

all of them,<\/span><\/p>\n

in the morning,<\/span><\/p>\n

still dark,<\/span><\/p>\n

but dawning,<\/span><\/p>\n

as I tread my garage<\/span><\/p>\n

on my way<\/span><\/p>\n

to walk the dogs<\/span><\/p>\n

in the woods of the refuge.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cHello birdies!\u201d I greet them<\/span><\/p>\n

with my swallow greeting voice.<\/span><\/p>\n

They alight and our day has begun.<\/span><\/p>\n

When they begin to mass,<\/span><\/p>\n

I watch them more,<\/span><\/p>\n

but never talk<\/span><\/p>\n

about it<\/span><\/p>\n

to anyone.<\/span><\/p>\n

Who is there to tell?<\/span><\/p>\n

What does it say<\/span><\/p>\n

about a man whose<\/span><\/p>\n

best friends are his<\/span><\/p>\n

three big dogs and<\/span><\/p>\n

the thirty to forty swallows<\/span><\/p>\n

that live in his<\/span><\/p>\n

shit stained garage?<\/span><\/p>\n

What does it say about a man<\/span><\/p>\n

who would vote<\/span><\/p>\n

Republican the rest<\/span><\/p>\n

of his life,<\/span><\/p>\n

and renounce<\/span><\/p>\n

the Rolling Stones,<\/span><\/p>\n

if it guaranteed<\/span><\/p>\n

the next occupants<\/span><\/p>\n

housed here<\/span><\/p>\n

let the nests be,<\/span><\/p>\n

garaged,<\/span><\/p>\n

and want<\/span><\/p>\n

to recline on the lawn,<\/span><\/p>\n

maybe even alone,<\/span><\/p>\n

and watch the swallows<\/span><\/p>\n

mass on the power line?<\/span><\/p>\n\n

\n <\/div>\n\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

For the third or fourth dusk in a row, the thirty to forty that live in my garage mass on the power line, joining others from the refuge, one hundred to two hundred strong, doing what swallows do before they fly south to escape the Oregon Coast winter rain that drove Meriwether Lewis insane. Reclined […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":4304,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5,42],"tags":[818,88],"class_list":["post-4303","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-meditations","category-poetry","tag-barn-swallows","tag-poetry","has-post-title","has-post-date","has-post-category","has-post-tag","has-post-comment","has-post-author",""],"builder_content":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nestuccaspitpress.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4303","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nestuccaspitpress.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nestuccaspitpress.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nestuccaspitpress.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nestuccaspitpress.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4303"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.nestuccaspitpress.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4303\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4305,"href":"https:\/\/www.nestuccaspitpress.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4303\/revisions\/4305"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nestuccaspitpress.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/4304"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nestuccaspitpress.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4303"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nestuccaspitpress.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4303"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nestuccaspitpress.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4303"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}