Kookaburra

after Wallace Stevens

1.
behind a blind of leaves
kookaburra is peek-a
boo in his hide of dapple on feather

2.
fisher king; his house
is the unhealed wound in the trunk
of river gum

3.
his a black humor; perched on a branch above us
a writhe of snake in his beak

4.
the laugh
and the joke he laughs at
joke laugh kookaburra one

5.
more shostakovich than schubert
an instrument of torment
he hacks through silence
like a pair of blunt scissors
hanging it in shreds

6.
do our names know us
as he is known laughing
jackass or settlers clock
ancient as dreamtime alarm
waking the sky-gods at dawn
to stoke the great sky-fire

7.
guuguubarra bird
your Wirradjuri loanword name
tames the tongue to sound in the ear
so we hear you guuguuguuguu
barrararrararrararra you you onomatopoeic kookoo kookaburrarurrarurrakookakookaburrakookookookoookoo

8.
at her pre-school concert she sings
kookaburra sits on electric wire
jumping up and down with his pants on fire
her eyes blue laugh the flick of blue on his quick wings

9.
not one for going around
in circles beating about the bush or gazing into
he is a straightforward fellow who gets
to the beaks pertinent point

10.
our party trick
his cue the sizzle of the barbecue
when he swoops and snatches a sausage
the audience applauds

11.
he conducts the morning lesson
beginners bracket of six or seven notes
kook-kook-kook-kook-kaa-kaa-kaa
youngster repeating the racket over
and over until a mimicking magpie
has the unfinished perfect
to fool us when they’re gone

12.
we believed his little dagger
parry for the cat
until a rag of feathers saddened
our back step

13.
lamp-light falls
on a page of small stanzas
kookaburra tail feather
marking thirteen of blackbird
in a tattered anthology