And something more optimistic...
THE CARDINALS
Loren Eiseley
The ways of the wild are queer
by human standards
but long ago the Hebraic Old Testament God
gave warning when he said,
my ways are not your ways, implying
the storm that rages
out of human understanding,
implying time beyond time,
space beyond space,
stars beyond stars.
I create evil, he said
and make the good, that too,
in proportion.
Here on my window ledge
two cardinals,
male and female,
having lived alone all winter
in that silence of the solitary
who seek their own food
and depend on no one,
suddenly exchange seeds
in an ancient ritual
welcoming spring.
They are not too intimate,
the horn of the beak preventing,
They are very wild
but grave and dignified-
at this moment
so much so that if I could
with proper manners
I should like to give
a seed to you.
