Charles Pierre
Albatross
From this teeming
birth rock and
sedentary nest,
this cramped
island’s squabbling
domesticity,
I fly to unsettled waters,
my one companion
the fugitive wind.
Tern
No vision this
white flash
against the dun sky,
but a pulsing form,
a feathered blur,
a bird plummeting
through air, splash, and up
with a wriggling gift
from the cold shallows.