Diptych
Pity the poor planet
—Robert Lowell
1. Deepwater Horizon (2010)
First a doe breaking cover from the underbrush,
Chased by a pair of feral cats.
Then, days later,
the near wing-clipped collision
Of a nighthawk and bat.
They felt like omens when the rig went nova,
Riddling coral reefs with those currents,
And the salt wedge of the estuary.
With crude oil and chemical dispersants.
After which:
the wrack of turtles and dying fish,
The tarred-and-feathered birds,
A sperm whale, fuchsia, filmed from above,
Breaching where the waters burned.
I still can’t get past what the cameraman said—
“It looked like it had been basted.”
2. “Zoo Owner Frees Animals, Kills Self” (2012)
The cages flung open, one by one,
Like the seals of some dry-run Revelation,
He sent them out into the Ohio night,
Wild and baffled,
whelmed by the scents
They’d caught hints of through their fences—
Wolves and grizzlies, shadow-slinking cats,
All scoped now within cross-hairs
And the infrared light of the flares.
All but that one poor wayward creature,
His pistol about to flower in his mouth.
Walkie-talkie static.
Sudden rifle bursts.
The frost-lit lawns in lockdown . . .
Ohio, where the passenger pigeon died,
Whose flights once plenished the skies.
