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Raphael Dagold 
Sometimes there is a shape to them,
the blackbirds an arc or swirl, a wave,
the air like water following
itself around a rock.
And sometimes the air bursts
with the black specks
suddenly like fall leaves
gusted ahead of storm clouds
before the rain has come
to batter them out of the sky,
a great crowd of leaves
like a startled flock before it´s a shape.
The road goes down to the river
and the crowd is there in a startle
from the field´s edge
low across the dirt,
the air full with it,
almost swollen, so large, right there,
as if the sky is in front of my face,
something to rush towards and be in it,
like a building half-demolished
before an excavation for a new oneInt
exposed rooms and hallways,
floors with wall-to-wall carpet
dripping from a lip jumbled with plumbing
and chunks of concrete hanging on rebar
making it more present
than in its life of still composure:
to be in it, eye mesmerized,
no scale anymore, to rush in
and through it, this bird one way,
that one another, all of them
a tumbling swarm from one side
of the road to the other
before they´re a flock and turn
their wingtips thin to the horizon
so for a moment disappear,
then settle into the field.
The dirt at the field´s edge is dry, and light.
Tiny stones float on the fine layer.
It´s soft and in the shade it´s cool,
in the sun it´s hot to the hand.
Here where the blackbirds have added
and taken, where my fingers press
and their impression stays--
my hand, the heel, the palm,
the hand can lift and leave itself,
its fingers filled with air,
here where the birds have passed.
Where the body has just come back.
Where the blackbirds have
broken and made their shape.
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