down and over,
through the scumbled leaves,
fallen branches,
through the knotted catbrier,
I kept going. Finally
I could not
save my arms
from thorns; soon
the mosquitoes

This great egret regally watched all the comings and goings from its perch aboard a boat at a Key West, Florida, dock. -- Photo by Pat Bean
smelled me, hot
and wounded, and came
wheeling and whining.
And that’s how I came
to the edge of the pond:
black and empty
except for a spindle
of bleached reeds
at the far shore
which, as I looked,
wrinkled suddenly
into three egrets – – –
a shower
of white fire!
Even half-asleep they had
such faith in the world
that had made them – – –
tilting through the water,
unruffled, sure,
by the laws
of their faith not logic,
they opened their wings
softly and stepped
over every dark thing.

Snowy egret on left, great egret on right, northern shoveler in the water in Texas' Rio Grande Valley. -- Photo by Pat Bean
When I first became one of those crazy birders, it was easy to identify a snowy egret, which for a long time was the only egret that I saw. They were these tall, white, graceful birds with a long, slender black bill, and black legs with golden-yellow feet, which I liked to think of as their slippers. I saw these delightful shorebirds just about anywhere there was water when I lived in Northern Utah.
Lovely egrets. Their (intact) feathers look far better perched on that log than on a hat…
I’ve seen this egret many times before on the boats in Key West. You got a great picture of him/her.
Thanks Mark.