The Halcyon Bird.

A Confounded Kingfisher.

 

Wish.

For the sky to paint your back, blue as the enameled coloured sea, hitting a single white shingle shore. For the sun to burn your breast forever red. A heart to pump ripe into deep cut life..

Fly away higher, away from the biblical flood of ages. Away from the speck of singular spectacular light that controls all that you wished for.

Watch

Bright but unseen. Hunting by diving, pushing forward the downward air. Flashed spear headed. Pointed scale armour silver twisting dripping. Freshwater green beating reflections back from shadows under weeping trees. Seeming to fly backwards, beating the silver head until dead. Pray against the cross made white tree with gold peeling bark.

Twist the iridescent blue wing flashing lighter reflections against your hunters life.

Still.

Life circles below, dirt brown and rippled. Wandering through the water gothics, catching the shafted sunlight insinuated into three dimensional dances. Waved patches of insect motes glittering across a surface web of mathematical glass. Bottle coloured river waving earthy watercolour paint brushes dispersed in liquid. Deep and deeper to where the long jawed carnivores wait in old dead reeded arches.

Breathe.

Rushes of burnt black heads rising on a cow day breeze. Cloven in mud sliding. Shouts and singular wishes across an ancient ford broken with even older stone. Feathered knotted banging and gyro dragons transparent writ across the fly blown exploded brown.

Halcyon of days. Feeding bags of needled young, head poking and squabbling in white entrance dripped holes.

Listen.

Cup the air wing laboured. Large beast beats away into sunset streaked air. Screamed Summer hunting high with flittered mouse rag following. Wing blue fading dark and lazuli skies. The Pleiades burn and the Halcyon bird seeks its brightest light.

Fly.

Author's Note

If we listen to some stories, in those days the Halcyon was a dull brown bird not the beautiful kingfisher we see flashing across our rivers. After the flood Noah first sent out a raven which fed only on the carrion and did not return. The second bird Noah released from Mt Ararat was the Kingfisher, the Halcyon. Instead of flying out across the receding waters the halcyon flew upwards and upwards until its back turned the colour of the sky. Still it flew up until the heat of the sun burned its breast red. The Pleiades are associated with the Kingfisher in Greek Myth. The picture is mine and is called Waterland.

Reviews

[jacob erin-cilberto]

i like the "two poems in one" feel to this...perhaps as was said...part is like an outline..

but could almost stand on its end.

i was enthralled by your description as i was when i read Tolkien.
and i love the bird going straight up---

love blue, my favorite color..and i live on a street called Blue Jay Lane...they are beautiful...we have many, as well as Bluebirds...

there is something peaceful about that color bird blended in with others.

there is much peaceful about this piece.

really nice writing.

jacob

[Ken Simm.]

I use a lot of blue in my paintings and other artwork Jacob. Perhaps that is why the Kingfisher story appeals to me so much. I've wanted to include the legend in writing for so long now. I am so glad you like it.

[FJ Davis]

Like the picture; looking through a flowing clear-water lens certainly makes the waterway's contents appear sharper.
The Wish, Watch, Still, Breathe and Listen must be more than mere poetic outline.
Enjoyed your sometimes fanciful, always gorgeous, account of a magnificent bird--and all the metaphorical applications that account may engender.
Your work, Ken, is consistently top-notch.

[Ken Simm.]

I suppose the wish etc is my imposition into the landscape. I once had a kingfisher land on my toe and keep fishing.

[Leslie Philibert]

Had a look at this and like it a lot. I think Ken writes very gently and peacefully, prose you can relax with, and from the style here with its unusual syntax even a bit like James Joyce. So a good read that deserves all the credit it has got.

[Ken Simm.]

Glad you think so Leslie. Its not always so peaceful however.

[Leslie Philibert]

And of course you are right ! What I meant to say is your writing requires
a careful reading, and when I look at it I take time and enjoy the style, the
content is full of all kinds of emotions...

[Ken Simm.]

Many, many thanks for that Leslie. I don't always feel I achieve the range I want but I am glad you think that I'm getting there.

[Chris]

I took the liberty of MY timing as I read this aloud... parts NEEDED to RUN - breathless and freefalling while others demanded pause and intent... the feel of it afterwards made me glad I paused - here - with your thoughts.

Thanks man.

[Ken Simm.]

That was the intent Chris. I'm glad you noticed and I bet your timing was perfect.

[Chris]

I tasted the aerie from beneath and as the wings rose and curved about the plumes of life rising and falling at life's whim. The effect of the flow upon the content was palpable... and worth the effort.

[Shelley Holt-Lowrey]

Mister... Wow do funny waters run deep. This is a beautiful and artful piece. I loved simply reading it... and then re-reading it to pull the meaning from it. Lyrical in composition and reverent in its execution. Beautiful Ken. Thank you for the RR. Always an education with you now isn't it.

[Ken Simm.]

Hope so. But telll me if I'm becoming an anorak.

[W.k.kortas]

I am not immune to the thought that this may only ostensibly about the kingfisher. The pacing is immaculate, the use of language--"single white shingle shore", "rushes of burnt black heads" et al--enviable in its arrangement and vocabulary. It earns its place among its Confounded brethren.

[Ken Simm.]

It is not going too far to say that all this would not have happened without your support my friend. I mean that.

[W.k.kortas]

If that is the case, then I can say I've accomplished something that is very worthwhile.

[EMF]

Ken... you are an artist. Your canvas, the page, your medium words. the colours you create, dazzling. I cannot sing your praises highly enough. Damn.... and I'd made my mind up I was going to be analytical as well. OK. Your damn hot and I'm jealous as intercourse

[Ken Simm.]

Jealous as that...... I am honoured. What's intercourse?

[EMF]

Conversation between adults.... Oh Bugger. I'm going to have to have 'The Chat' again...

[Ken Simm.]

Do I have to sit down and behave again?

[EMF]

No. Just hold this large bag of garden peas in your lap... again

[Ken Simm.]

Cool.

[Shelley Holt-Lowrey]

Oh my ... all of this under that write? SEE? Funny and deep. Both of you... now knock it off! You're ruining my silent reverent moment with the poetry. Shhhh

[EMF]

Ken. We've just been told to Shhhh. That is so tempting to ignore. But the dame is wearing a hat.

[Shelley Holt-Lowrey]

Darn tootin' (Total American-ism!)

[Shelley Holt-Lowrey]

Said the dame sportin' a hat.

[Ken Simm.]

Wernt me Miss. It was him Miss honest.

[EMF]

Ken... Stand up to the Dame. Never let a hat intimidate you. Unless it's mine of course.

[Shelley Holt-Lowrey]

Yeah ken. I am harmless. Unless you mess with me. Then Faustus will take you on. He is good like that.

[Ken Simm.]

Matron says I shouldn't play with you two anymore. You are naughty. So I'm taking my bat home, so there with knobs on.

[emmajoy]

'Rushes of burnt black heads rising on a cow day breeze. Cloven in mud sliding. Shouts and singular wishes across an ancient ford broken with even older stone. Feathered knotted banging and gyro dragons transparent writ across the fly blown exploded brown.' Extraordinary, unique phrasing.

Apart from the 'beating dead' - which is graphic shuddering truth, that second area is everything the kingfisher is - words to envy, a series of happenings that really hit the mind. Your writing never fails to touch emotions, never fails to turn myth into something more tangible.

[Ed Hart]

i love the songs in your heart

[Emily B]

yes, oh yes . . . and i should add that the image is breath-taking