Calling in the Crows
by Alison Stormwolf

Shamanistic poem, written when newly re-located to Edinburgh and homesick for the country and the crows in the trees all around my cottage there.

Hear my voice in your cold dark dawn
frosty branches and purple streaked sky.
Awake!
rouse yourselves!
heads removed from covering wing.

Come now, to this small city dwelling.

Fly above the cliffs and the barren cornfields,
majestic architecture and city churches.
Let me hear your noisy ponderings
as to the reason for your summons
in adjacent bleak trees,
devoid now of foliage,
mute,
trusting in seasons.

Sloping down to the river
flowing always flowing…
Like life,
breath..
no matter what the day
has brought.

En-masse, your precious black bodies
reminiscent of *Armadale
talk to me beyond words,
beyond worlds....
Become a covert shield,
A dark place of re-connection;
Power.

Come now with comfort
and tales of new tomorrows on your beaks;
Petitioned from the steel horizon
by one who loves to hear your stories.

Cover me in blue black feathers,
share your beating hearts with me.
Shelter me
among your squawking chaos.

Peck me to life.

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