Listening to Cuckoos

Robert Adamson

Two unchanging notes; to us, words -- always those high 

 elongated notes. Red-eyed koels with feathered earmuffs, 

downward-ending notes that pour through a falling of night 

 coming over the distances, words that don't change. 

The two notes remain, a split phrase, two words 

 meaning, not exactly a self -- not quite, the first day of spring. 

The moment of utterance, candour becomes 

 the piercing, whistled syllables. Penetrating the dark green 

of twilight, the storm birds call, two notes, two words, 

 and cackle in the broken-egged dawn, in the echoing light.