(Featured image: crow outside the Bin Forest near Huntly, Scotland. Courtesy Wolf Clifton – Animal People, Inc.)
The crow that wakes me
Announcing dawn
Carries me back,
In these first, soft, clear moments,
To the Scottish Border country,
When, as a child,
I roamed the brown and purple hills
With the dog, Darroch
Who swam rivers
And burrowed through rabbit warrens
With heroic abandon.
The crows were always there,
Circling on the clear, still air
Raucously screeching in the trees,
Their coal black bodies
Gliding over the dark moors
Keeping watch
Sharing secrets
With those who would listen.
They have been with me
Over continents and over time,
Part of me, part of earth
Enduring as the new day that dawns
And brings the gift of light
__
Mary de La Valette
November 1991
