These are the Sky-Peaks

here you find the

hovering fragilities,

a toppling consciousness of

breaking, of enduring

in shards of light and

twisted feathers, and

yesterday’s snowflakes

still half-sodden on the

ground – another dream

to melt for the future.

I happened upon this kestrel while hiking in the Pyrenees – or, at least, what is probably or most likely just possibly a kestrel; birds are hard to ID when they are a) far away and b) also you really don’t what anything is there? At all? It might also be a falcon (as in peregrine), which opens up a whole new realm of possibilities.

We saw two of them – one excruciatingly close, but unfortunately by the time camera was extracted, lens attached, hot chocolate drunk, etc., it became a very familiar story. So instead I watched it from afar as it watched the mountains – so small amongst the sky and so large as well, in its self-assured confidence.

And then, like so many other birds, I looked down, looked back up, and it was gone – sans wing-beat, sans form, sans movement, sans everything.