A Shepherd's Sky Poem by Felix Bongjoh

(i)

Clouds pile like tinder
rolled off to a corner weaving
reeds with flint feathers
and daffodil stalks and stems.

Fossil and coin floss
settle beneath and sprawl
into saw dust and lumber
peelings in smaller specks of clouds.

Dusk sets a fire to burn
out the sky, leaving patches
of rosewood smoke
and cherry traces of blood

dripping off behind
candy and rose threads knotted
with a fire ginger to blaze

and bleed, as clouds regroup
in pink and gold patches.

(ii)

Beneath the bloody screaming
sky in dark cloudy smoke
a cardinal dives out of a tree
and a tanager and crimson rosella

hover with them over a river
for over a half-hour until
late evening sunshine sprays
its wings over the crooning stretch.

Through a winding corridor
in the grass fields, a lone shepherd
chats with the birds muttering

and whispering with the wind, he hears
a young man bawl out

"Those blackbirds trotting all over
are digging out with claws
the breath of folks mowed

into shallow graves and covered
in a flash, as lightning flashed."