States of Poetry - Poems
'So Many Throats' by James Charlton | States of Poetry Tasmania - Series Two
by James Charlton •
There is speech everywhere:
the inaudible conversation of orchids;
the quiet breathings of ironbark forest.
Birds bring energy from the sky.
A bronzewing murmurs a low OM.
She intones the OM alone, as we all must,
and clatters when she takes leave.
The OM attunes itself to inner ears;
the unfathomable OM
of the living, the dead, the light itself.
Black coffee of a still pool.
Mossies busy themselves.
Full blaze of Spring.
Crows do not announce their cleverness,
but caw with desolate caw.
So many throats precede our own.
This morning, scratchy intonations
of a butcherbird, still learning its name.
James Charlton