RAVEN

A raven flying through one of Nietzsche's poems

Misjudged his flight (he was in translation

And forgot that old German miles are longer

Or shorter than English miles and that the Reichsmielle –

A monster almost five of our miles long –

Has been outlawed since 1908) and sits now,

Irritably, in the river birch tree enshadowing my lawn.

He is Winter's bird and complains of the hot weather.

He has no known source of income but looks well-fed

(Like less literary ravens, he is adept at stealing

And has a jeweler's eye for things that glitter.)

He claims kin with the Tlingit Raven who rescued daylight

And created the world, but this seems unlikely.

For the moment, his place in Nietzsche's poem

Is occupied by an albino crow who almost disappears

In the snow swirling through the first and sixth stanzas.