Gise Pedersen Sets Me Straight On A Matter Of Natural History Poem by Mike Finley

'No, you've got this part all wrong, '
Says Gise, swatting a poem about birds
With the back of one hand.

'You have whippoorwills sobbing in the limbs
Of poplars, but whippoorwills don't perch
In poplars, whippoorwills don't perch anywhere,

Because their legs are just tiny twigs,
They are gone into atrophy, no muscle left,
So all they can do is plop themselves

Flat on the ground and make the best of it
There on their haunches. And furthermore,
What is this sobbing business? It's poetic

But hardly accurate. Their cry is more
Like a cheer, it is a call my son Peter,
Before he died, liked to imitate

On his walks home from school.
Many times, late summer nights in our cabin,
Hendrik and I would be feeling morose,

Only to hear out there in the darkness
The cry of a creature pressed close
And shouting from the cold of this earth

To all who might hear him:
VIP-poor-VEE! '




NOTE: This poem was included in the 1985 Pushcart Prize Anthology. I have always loved it because it was not about me!