HERON

Here hunts heron. Here haunts heron. Huge-hinged heron. Grey-winged weapon.

Eked from iron and wreaked from blue and beaked with steel: heron, statue, seeks eel.

Rock still at weir sill. Stone still at weir sill. Dead still at weir sill. Still still at weir sill. Until, eelless at weir sill, heron magically . . . unstatues.

Out of the water creaks long-legs heron, old-priest heron, from hereon in all sticks and planks and rubber-bands, all clanks and clicks and rusty squeaks.

Now heron hauls himself into flight – early aviator, heavy freighter – and with steady wingbeats boosts his way through evening light to roost.