This week was the Open Write for Ethical ELA. I love how this event once a month inspires me to sit each day and write. I’m often surprised by what comes out on the page.
Fran Haley prompted us to write a bird story. To see her wonderful model poem and the prompt, click here. It brought back a memory for me.
Everyone has a bird story
Remember the time we saw the eagle
atop the bridge to Seattle?
A few days later, you read
the eagle died, a car hit it.Once we saw an eagle while canoeing,
elegantly soaring over our bayou–grand beauty
symbol of strength. Then you recalled
the Seattle eagle. That tragic death
hit us hard. He was “our” eagle.How can we claim ownership of a wild thing?
Margaret Simon, draft
Freedom is temporal.
The story remains.
Fran is not only a wonderful poet, writer, teacher, she also supports other writers and me with lovely comments. I feel the comments that most resonate with me are ones in which the writer makes a heart to heart connection. This was what Fran wrote about my poem: “I’d have mourned long over this loss as well. I find, as I grow older, these things strike deeper than they ever used to. Yesterday I came through a crossroads where woods had long grown over an old farm and it’s all being bulldozed for building houses, I presume. I thought of the majestic hawks and “my” eagle and wanted to weep – how far will the birds have to go to find a new home? “How can we claim ownership of a wild thing?” Because the wild thing is connected to us, to our essence, in some deep way; as the wild thing goes, so go we. I cannot help thinking of the eagle in your verse in another way, as our national emblem, especially in these true and haunting lines:”Freedom is temporary. The story remains.”
May this holiday season bring you lots of small moments of great joy!
Reflections on the Teche 
Yes. This is true. The story remains. I traveled out to Wash. state and my sister drove me to the coast where photographers line up with huge lenses to capture shots of eagles. I can see how they become “our” eagles when we share the experience. Thank goodness for Ethical ELA. This week’s support from Fran and Kim was especially good.
Thank you for your words about the Open Writes, Linda – I thoroughly enjoyed collaborating with Kim and am delighted you feel this way!
I feel the loss of “your” eagle as well as the loss of the farmland in Fran’s world. Her words “as the wild thing goes, so go we.” hit me hard. We pave over our planet so blithely, as if it’s not US we’re destroying…
I love your title, the knowledge from the get-go that this will be a story, and then it becomes a story within a story with a story around it. And not sure why, but using a comma here “the eagle died, a car hit it” instead of a semicolon or period was especially effective. Admiring your constancy in writing every month with Ethical ELA!
Margaret, I love the Ethical ELA Open Writes and look forward to them every month as well. Like you, “I am often surprised by what comes out on the page.” This speaks to the unique spiritual nature of poetry — to the poem that wants to be written by the particular poet, to the particular reader(s) that need that particular poem, and the deep interconnectedness of it all. It’s why I chose “birdspiration” as topic, for birds themselves are like poems. ‘Let me count the ways’… And everyone really does have a bird story – or several, more that we usually stop to think about. Your eagle poem pierced me through when I first read it, and still does. You sparked my reflection in those comments; I was thankful for it, and am thankful for your sharing them here. That photo of the eagle flying over Bayou Teche is breathtaking; I will live on that a long while!
Oh, Margaret, that question is lodged in my throat. “How can we claim ownership of a wild thing?” I claimed the great blue heron on campus for so many years and was devastated by its passing.
Thank you for sharing this lovely poem.
You’ve touched me, too, Margaret. I go every year to that lake that I often share on FB & look for a heron that returns every year, wondering how he’s doing. “The Story remains” – a line that counts for much of our lives.
Margaret, I feel so similarly – about the mama bear and cubs in my kitchen this summer. Whose home is it, really? I’m working on the poem – always asking myself, Who owns wild? (my working title). 🙂
Margaret, wow. I love reading your poem and Fran’s thoughtful comment. I love how your poem reaches such a powerful conclusion. We don’t own the wild, but the story remains. I love that so much, and I love how your story inspired Fran’s thoughts. You too–many small moments of great joy for you and yours this holiday season.
Thanks for your emotive and moving poem Margaret, and I think it’s just that our emotions and especially empathy that tie us to animals and others, and maybe also the circularity of life, and life cycles-beautiful contemplative post. I also enjoyed reading Fran’s response!
So many bird poems this week — I love it! Thank you for this empathetic take…
I’ve been reading about birds this week and though there are some hopeful stories about survival and populations of some climbing, the species that suffer make me very sad. Lovely poem and I will be thinking about the last two lines.
Margaret, your writing reminds me so much of the book I’m reading right now – Braiding Sweetgrass. It is filled with nature and the same types of questions you ask here. This is beautiful!
I listened to that book and had to buy a copy so I had access to the actual written words. A beautifully poetic book.
Margaret, I am still trying to read posts from Friday. Thanksgiving is always a busy time of the year for me. This one was marked by an accident. My little Aurora (almost 4) fell backward on a hotel bed when her family visited their grandparents in NJ. My daughter zoomed me when they arrived home. We did get to see her for my birthday and then the girls stayed over. Hence, I lost the whole weekend of just reading PF posts. Your bird story is sad. The great eagle is an American icon. Your ending lines resonated with me. Have a great week.
With all of my family here, I had little time to read other posts and now I’m back in school. Thanks for making the effort to read our posts. I hope your Aurora is feeling better. My son-in-law fell down our stairs with the 11 month old in his arms. Everyone was OK, but he was quite sore for a few days.
Margaret, such a beautiful photo and an emotional poem; you have moved me. Fran’s prompt, poem, and response also moves me. I am sorry that after you had a wonderful connection to the eagle in Seattle, you found out it died. I understand how that makes both of you sad. Survival in the animal world is difficult, which is a way of live, but your husband’s and your memory, your connection of your eagle is still alive, and you will always have that to hold and think of when you need it. I also call wild animals in my yard or sometimes in another area mine. For example, when I see my downy woodpeckers, cardinals, finches, bluebirds… I always say to them, thank you my downy for bringing me the light of you. Thank you, my Mr. Cardinal for your gift of singing good morning. It’s not that think I own them, but rather for a short time the connection I’ve made with the bird, they seem like mine. Thank you for your poignant poem and for your inspiration.
I’m glad I circled back around to read your and Fran’s poetic conversation about the temporal nature of freedom and life. My bird story, bald eagle specifically, was when we saw eagles nesting in Prairie du Sac, Wisconsin below the Hydroelectric dam years ago. The juxtaposition of man-made and nature was striking.