Not a Beam of Light

Wendy Mooney

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This is not a beam of light.
It's a pigeon moving to settle
Under the chimney that gives no shelter really.

This is not a bird in flight.
It's a bird craving to be upheld
By an earthiness not to be found in air,

His white chest to red warmth:
Tell me the sight of him delights you,
That there are walls that draw you to come and lean,

Fool you into believing
That even though the sky is falling
All is right, and the view still wide and gleaming

If only brick supports you -
If its heat enters in your fingers,
Fuses you with fire, the sun that was before,

So nothing can remove you.
That after the storm, stone sustains you.
That you do not name yourself bird, but coward

And only human, flightless,
Scared of the plunge through open spaces -
Onlooker, groper of chimney pots, of walls.

This is not a beam of light.
It's a pigeon moving to settle
Under the chimney that gives no shelter really.

This is not a bird in flight.
It's a bird craving to be upheld
By an earthiness not to be found in air.

Wendy Mooney has previously had poems published in Poetry Ireland Review and in Crannog. She lives in Dublin.

WOW! Magazine  Issue 6  2007