Three Poems by John Brantingham

 

This World

In the morning, 

the dog sniffs out 

some rabbits 

in our planters, 

and it’s all we can do 

to keep them 

out of her jaws.

Later, hawks circle above.

I know where a fox den 

is down the road,

and at least one mink 

lives by the creek. 

Where there’s one, 

there’s more. 

When I’m watering 

the plants 

I tell the rabbits 

they can stay

as long as they need. 

I tell them 

this world 

wasn’t designed 

for kindness. 

I tell them 

to keep 

to the shadows, 

to move 

only at night.

First Frog

When I adjust the pot, 

I find the first frog of spring, 

no longer hidden. 

I don’t lift him. 

It’s cool enough this morning 

that he can’t move, 

so I could, but I just touch 

his back with a finger tip 

and stroke him. 

It occurs to me 

to speak the prayer 

from my childhood: 

“in nomine patris 

et filii 

et spiritus sancti,” 

but he is beyond my need 

for those words. 

He has what is necessary

inside himself and around 

him in my backyard. I replace 

the pot to hide him from my dog.

Of the Allegheny

This year my wife and I moved 

back to the Allegheny, 

the river of my childhood, 

and once again, I am of the river. 

I drink its waters, 

which the city pumps into my house, 

and (after the city treats it)

rejoins the stream, 

so the river flows through me as well,

as it flows through my neighbors 

and the trees and the vultures 

who circle above deer and woodchucks 

and my wife and the muskrat 

who lives in the culvert 

at the end of the street. 

We are the Allegheny, 

which moves well beyond the little blue line 

the mapmakers would have you believe it is. 

It is not just in us. 

It is us. 

It strengthens our bones 

and softens our skin. 

Annie tells me that it is good 

to be of the Allegheny, 

just as it is good to be of the earth. 

She says we are of the sky and the stars too. 

I think she is right, 

but right now my mind 

is not floating that far out. 

It too is of the Allegheny, 

grateful to be there.

___

John Brantingham was Sequoia and Kings Canyon National Parks’ first poet laureate. His work has been featured in hundreds of magazines. He has twenty-one books of poetry, memoir, and fiction including his latest, Life: Orange to Pear (Bamboo Dart Press) and Kitkitdizzi (Bamboo Dart Press). He lives in Jamestown, New York and can be found on https://www.johnbrantingham.com/

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