Poems by Bonnie Bishop

Oregon

for Clare

by Bonnie Bishop

From Canary Spring 2017

Bonnie lives on a 40-acre outcropping of ancient shale and limestone beds, part of the 600 year old Cambrian sedimentary Weymout Formation. This little island in the North Atlantic is connected to the mainland by a mile and a half long tombolo and is famous among geologists for its gabbro.

Down through the twilight we drove,
leaving behind the promontory,
the long view of the misty beach

punctuated by boulders big as hotels,
the lavender horizon and mottled sky,
down through deep green groves

we rode, talking about resurrection,
the kind when people we know have
stepped out of the tomb, blinking,

waving away spider webs, stepped
away from damage and despair
into the green life that seems

to have been waiting for them all along,
when an elk stepped out of the path of our car
into the coniferous, ferny-floored forest

and turned her huge beautiful head toward us
before vanishing.