The heron on the lake on sunset, digital watercolor painting Copyright Martina Vaculikova at 123RF

Summer has been slow to arrive this year. But finally the weather is warming up and soon perhaps we’ll be searching out shady places and even thinking of taking off our shoes and wading in the creek. But only if the heron has stopped stalking the bank, caught his fish for the day and left. He has an awesome presence and we celebrate his visits.

Image from Pixabay

Heron

Heron has an awkward grace. Sometimes,

rising from the creek, he claps his wings

then hangs, a grey angel above the bank,

austere and still until another thrust

lifts him into trees. The dog barks,

scared my grandchild grips my hand.

Spreading pennons cover us as heron sails

above our heads—both shadow and a blessing.

Felicity Sidnell Reid

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