Discovering a New Poet

I subscribe to The Writer's Almanac Online hosted by Garrison Keillor. Every day a post drops into my Google Reader featuring a new poem. Today I read a poem by David Wagoner and thought it tied in nicely with my post yesterday about the thorny topic of "forethought of grief". Notice how he describes how nature lives in the present moment, mindful of survival but overwhelmed at times by the association with the human animal who lives by different rules. This poem speaks to me about trust, about stopping to notice, about the innocence (in human terms) of animals who (seemingly) do not stress about forethought of grief. And what about those cars honking, like flying geese who honk to get the attention of the leader and confirm their direction in life? Interesting thoughts these.

Stopping along the Way

by David Wagoner

Heading south toward campus, my car
stops suddenly, abruptly, almost
on its own. My right foot
has found the brake pedal
before my eyes can admire
a very young possum strolling
across our right of way
at his personal intersection
of human cross-purposes,
some of whose breaks are squeaking
behind us now. The possum
pauses, lowers his gray-pink-
and-sooty snout to drink in
the odor of something
among the fallen and flattened
sycamore leaves. I've seen
too many of him lying down
even flatter than seemed
possible beside roads
and in gutters. I realize
my car's mere presence looming
over him won't quicken
those four deliberate paws,
won't urge him out of danger,
but before I can think or make
some warning sign, two cars
are honking. He lifts his head
dreamily, comparing
that sound to some distant sound
somewhere deep, far back
in his old, new mind, then begins
strolling forward again
and up onto the grass
among the unloaded, locked,
and abandoned bicycles
and empties and leaflets left
by fraternal and sisterly
orders on their own ways
to and from understanding
or back to forbidden gardens
and holes in the ground. Again
a car behind me honks.
And another. It's what geese do
heading south at the beginning
of winter. They want to know
the one in front still believes
they're there and are trusting him
to be sure where they're all going.

"Stopping along the Way" by David Wagoner from A Map of the Night. © University of Illinois Press, 2008.

I found another great poem by David Wagoner about feeding the gulls, something that still gives my Mother joy at age 91. I'll post that poem tomorrow. At this time, poetry seems to be the path of least resistance in this blog. When all I want to do (but won't) is rant and rave and scour out misery, I'll let someone else's words lead me into another world of thought.