September 2022
Bio Note: I am a Montana poet and writer who has worked in Arts-in-Schools and Communities programs throughout the Rocky Mountain west and Midwest for nearly five decades. I live and write in "Flyover Country", the vast, beautiful, geographically complex, sparsely populated, economically challenged Rocky Mountain West/Northern High Plains, where I was born and where I have lived most of my life. It is home to a rapidly aging population of stoic, hardworking people whose lands and livelihoods (plant and animal agriculture, timber, mining, tourism) are disproportionally impacted by climate change and cultural shifts. Our lives and voices are the subject of my recent chapbook, In January, The Geese, which won the Comstock Review 35th Anniversary 2021 Poetry Chapbook Prize.
Fractal Nautilus
after a print by Bill Fleming
Caught squared in intricate sepia
crosshatch as if in a matrix
of Devonian or Cretaceous stone,
little galaxy of chamber and septa,
whose spiraling Saint Fibonacci learned
from thinking of breeding rabbits:
one, one, two, three, five,
eight, thirteen, thirty-four,
on to infinity –
as fractals also infinitely
iterate their complex patterning
across all scales.
Look –
this frozen turbulence,
sweet snail once living:
reach in, reach
in to feel
its unending pulsing
heart.
Awakenining, 5 am, a Pantoum
Night ends. It has soft edges. Dawn unfolds
inward and under. The owl, feathered bark,
one with the tree. The wind stops, holds
its breath, waits while the stars unspark.
Inward and under, the owl, feathered bark,
silent. In the east there is palest light –
its breath waits while the stars unspark
one note, another, the little birds, their voices bright.
Silent in the east, there is palest light.
Collared doves, the robins, song sparrows, chickadees –
one note, another, the little birds, their voices bright
trill and whistle, intricate cascades of melody.
Collared doves, the robins, song sparrows, chickadees,
one with the trees. The wind stops, holds
trill and whistle, intricate cascades of melody.
Night ends. It has soft edges. Dawn unfolds.
Just at Dark
I am listening
to some small soft life
busily rummaging
under drifts of leaves
piled against the back
of the house, some wee
heart housed in fur
murmuring to itself,
a sound half squeak,
half whisper, while
its tiny hands pillage
for worm, bug, or seed
in the worn debris
of last year's cast-off
clothes – safe
in my shadow
for this little while
from the striped stray cat
and the owl.
©2022 B. J. Buckley
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