The south wind blows across the Kaw
and bounces up off the limestone levee,
an invisible ridge rising up toward the blue sky
and then towards the stars further above, unseen.
Air rises, it is easy to say,
and yet flight seems almost a miracle.
The vulture swoops down, cutting through
the clear sky, coming to rest
on the sandbar.
Two there, they stand, looking out
over the water rippling ever downstream,
and then, with a leap, one dives up
into the south wind, scooping and pulling buckets of air.
And then farther down the river,
effortlessly again, he rises up
on the weight of air.
And on the crest, the vulture
surfs the wave, a feather turns
slightly, no more, the great wings turn
circles on the south wind.
Effortlessly it all appears, but the effort
is mostly unseen. Generations
of vultures have practiced that feather
turn, and before that, fiber and bone
surfed evolving DNA.
And the south wind does not blow
out of no where, an immense fire
burns.
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