Thursday, February 11, 2010

HUBBLE THURSDAY 11 FEBRUARY 2010

(Copernicus Crater on Earth's Moon)

Every Thursday, I post a very large photograph of some corner of space captured by the Hubble Space Telescope and available online from the picture album at HubbleSite, followed by poetry after the jump.


THE WOODS AT NIGHT

by May Swenson

The binocular owl,
fastened to a limb
like a lantern
all night long,

sees where all
the other birds sleep:
towhee under leaves,
titmouse deep

in a twighouse,
sapsucker gripped
to a knothole lip,
redwing in the reeds,

swallow in the willow,
flicker in the oak -
but cannot see poor
whippoorwill

under the hill
in deadbrush nest,
who's awake, too -
with stricken eye

flayed by the moon
her brindled breast
repeats, repeats, repeats its plea
for cruelty.

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