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I waken, alert,
To the songs of the dark night,
Hunkering shadow-shaped coyotes,
Mimicking, throwing plaintive howls,
Against the stark, crying vibrato
Of sleek, red-eyed jurassic loons,
They worship in tandem,
Pledging love to the spectral moon,
A timeless nocturnal duet.
Tall conifers and sleeping mountains harken,
Sheltering those calls, echoing, echoing,
Magnified across still, silver water,
Lonely sounds, proud, primitive, wild,
Undaunted,
Triumphant melodic affirmations of survival,
Of life bravely continued,
“We..are..still.. here…”, they sing,
“After all!”
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Oh, YES! Beautifully descriptive. Will be sharing.
Many thanks Ethan for reading and leaving such lovely words!
Entirely my pleasure. The last four lines especially struck a chord:
Triumphant melodic affirmations of survival,
Of life bravely continued,
“We..are..still.. here…”, they sing,
“After all!”
Triumphant, indeed!
Loons and coyotes have both been hunted historically, and coyotes in particular continue to be persecuted. For example, hunting and trapping 5 months of the year here in NY State. Wasteful “Coyote Killing Contests” have surfaced here, too, unfortunately. Both species have sad histories but your poem emphasizes their amazing resilience and encourages human advocacy.
https://www.adirondackalmanack.com/2017/08/hard-to-believe-beloved-loons-were-once-hunted.html
Thanks for the reference and link to the very enlightening article Ethan. Amazing and sad to read. Hope awareness will be heightened and advocacy strengthened to protect these animals and other wildlife of the North Country.
Hello Annette, I enjoy your poems and have saved some of them. I vacation on Twitchell Lake not far from Inlet, and on July 4th weekend we have a poetry event, with a dozen of us competing for “poet laureate” of Twitchell Lake, and one of the options is to read a poem by another person with feeling, preferably by memory. I may read one of your poems next July. My sons are hankering to do some fishing on Limekiln Lake.
Noel
Noel Sherry
9 Twitchell Lake, Big Moose, NY 13331
So glad you enjoyed this one Noel! Thanks for reading and for considering using one of my poems for the poetry event. It is an honor and I wish you much luck.
Loved the poem. We once camped at Limekiln Lake and enjoyed the loons.
Hi Anita! Thanks very much for your read and lovely words. Much appreciated. Limekiln Lake is such a beautiful place and hope you get to go back soon.
Wonderful, Annette. Poetry a reader can see. Thank you.
Hi and many thanks for your read and always encouraging words Jim! So glad you enjoyed this one.
I have always loved the loon calls and recently was honored by coyote song fests thru out the nite after living here for 15 years with only one brief concert until now. It helps that both my cats were with me and never awoke to the chorus but they (coyotes) have seemed to move on and I miss their hearing their musical messages.
Your tribute just brought back the memory…
Thank you.
Thanks so much Kathy for reading and sharing your lovely memory with me.