Motherbird

Motherbird Can't FlyMotherbird on my back, I cope uncertainly with the lift-off. Upstrokedownstroke upstroke up up up. She is all wingboneall weighty fragility. It's years now since she soared into the sky..But it's not the same sky! she calls out. Where are we?The energy it takes to stay up here with her, to hover!.Careful she cries, ever fearful for her life. Look out!Don't fly into the sun. Don't stall, don't stop, don't even….The wind snatches her voice. There's no route no narrative or plot.The sky has no end but we're near the end – of somewhere.Keep steadyshe commands.We're a single bird in flight..Motherbird Asks Me to Try Out Her New Stick.I open my wings.I close them.I open my heart. I close it.And open it a bit..Take hold of the stickthat I don't yetmight never need.Take a tentative step….Then Motherbird Met Fatherbird.and fatherbird met motherbirdso many feathers of the world.were ruffled. It was just after the War,and now this war – of attitudes..It's unnaturalprotested the birds on the airfield.. They're a different species…Rain couldn't drown the courtship.of motherbird and fatherbird.The clouds parted to let them through..The sky rang –and slowly, deliberately like a stage-set.a whole landscape slid into place.With certainty – and uncertainty.motherbird and fatherbirdflew off. Flew back. And settled..They didn't drift like leaves.This our home now they said.stretching the world at its seams..* * *.Her FeathersI envy motherbird her silken feathers –so much more beautiful than my own..They've acquired a silvery perfection..They're a nuisance she complains, so fine, so flyaway. They're marvellous I say –she's dismissiveand I can't convince her.Motherbird! I call to her. Hush! whisper the feathers. We give little away. You must place your ear very close to hear our snow-words..Nesting.Nowshe nests in me.along with allthat I've known.and all that I knowof what she has known –.~ Moniza Alvi was born in Pakistan and grew up in Hertfordshire, England. Her first two collections were published by Oxford University Press: The Country at My Shoulder (1993), shortlisted for the T.S. Eliot and Whitbread poetry prizes, and A Bowl of Warm Air (1996). Her later poetry titles have all been published by Bloodaxe and include Split World: Poems 1990-2005 (2008), Europa (2008) and At the Time ofPartition (2013). Both these last two books were Poetry Book Society Choices shortlisted for T.S. Eliot Prize.