Some of us are fortunate to find companions among the other creatures, and in this poem by T. Alan Broughton of Vermont, we sense a kind of friendship without dependency between our species and another.

Great Blue Heron

I drive past him each day in the swamp where he stands

on one leg, hunched as if dreaming of his own form

the surface reflects. Often I nearly forget to turn left,

buy fish and wine, be home in time to cook and chill.

Today the bird stays with me, as if I am moving through

the heron’s dream to share his sky or water—places

he will rise into on slow flapping wings or where

his long bill darts to catch unwary frogs. I’ve seen

his slate blue feathers lift him as dangling legs

fold back, I’ve seen him fly through the dying sun

and out again, entering night, entering my own sleep.

I only know this bird by a name we’ve wrapped him in,

and when I stand on my porch, fish in the broiler,

wine glass sweating against my palm, glint of sailboats

tacking home on dusky water, I try to imagine him

slowly descending to his nest, wise as he was

or ever will be, filling each moment with that moment’s

act or silence, and the evening folds itself around me.

American Life in Poetry is made possible by The Poetry Foundation, publisher of Poetry magazine. It is also supported by the Department of English at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln. Poem copyright ©2010 by T. Alan Broughton from his most recent book of poetry, A World Remembered, Carnegie Mellon University Press, 2010. Reprinted by permission of T. Alan Broughton and the publisher. Introduction copyright ©2010 by The Poetry Foundation. The introduction’s author, Ted Kooser, served as United States Poet Laureate Consultant in Poetry to the Library of Congress from 2004-2006. We do not accept unsolicited manuscripts.