4 poems by teacher, poet, and naturalist Richard Peake

Richard Peake in an African village in
Sierra Leone on a birding safari.

A native Virginian, Richard Peake became a Texas resident after retiring from the University of Virginia’s College at Wise. He published early poems in Impetus alongside John Ciardi and in The Georgia Review. Collections of his poetry include Wings Across… and Poems for Terence published by Vision Press, which also included poems of his in A Gathering at the Forks. He published Birds and Other Beasts in 2007. A member of The Poetry Society of Texas he has recently published in Avocet, Asinine Poetry, Boundless 2010 and 2011, Nature Croons, Ides of March, Raven Images, Skive, Sol Magazine, Shine Journal (one nominated for the Pushcart Prize), The Book of the Year PST 2010, 2011, and 2012,  The Road Not Taken, The Texas Poetry Calendar 2012, and elsewhere. A life-long naturalist, a father and grandfather, he teaches birds, Shakespeare, and writing in OLLi.

Richard Peake has been a featured poet at Friendswood Public Library poetry readings and we look forward to having him back in early 2013.

Electric Wings for Ars Poetica  

Like arctic terns in flight

from pole to pole

or swallows speeding to new nests

or metallic birds

that outpace the speed of sound

words grow wings

to fly around the world

as we let our thoughts migrate. 

For sad or happy thoughts

there is no transport like a poem

to speed emotions forth.

Across barriers of land or sea,

a poet’s words

can bring us serious things

or just a clever jest

to lift the poet’s wit with wings. 

With the speed of wireless phones

or the internet

words fly faster than terns or swallows

or sound-barrier-breaking planes

So let my poem

ascend on electric wings

to speed my praise

of a time to honor poetry.  

published in The Book of the Year 2010

My Cousins’ Fledermaus 

Their ID erred dismally.

I’m sure they didn’t know tequila can’t exist

without bats flying like night moths

to pollinate agave plants. And being only five

I was just as ignorant of the good bats do.

My aunt and cousins, confused by the German,

treated the poor flying creature

as if it were a mouse they dreaded

and might have stood on chairs to avoid

unaware that bats gobble night-flying insects,

not Mississippi women afraid of mice.

For them the flying mammal wandering in that night

brought dangers from a dark, bloody world

to tangle in their flowing locks

and suck their luscious virginal blood.

My cousins wielded weapons against this flying fury

whose fangs appeared ten inches long

to them, though to the young boy

hiding under a convenient table

the bat seemed fangless, distraught, befuddled

by the lights and by the brooms

belaboring it in awkward pursuit of its frantic flight—

a beast thought at the very least to carry rabies

from the haunts of vampires.

Screams and commands and deadly swipes

filled the room with eager mayhem

as bloodlust born of fear prevailed.

The flying mouse could not escape into the night.

Amazon warriors soon displayed to me its limp,

lifeless body—exulting in their victory

over the dark forces of the summer night. 

published in Raven Images, Nov., 2010

I Favor Three-toed Sloths

          for Theodore Roethke

Volcano watching, ungainly two-toed sloth

fell out of a scenic too-slender tree,

broke limbs, narrowly missing me—

clambered, slipperied back up with baleful wroth.

Clumsy two-toed, too-inquisitive sloths—

less careful how they climb and doze

than clever species with three toes—

should try pledging visitors troth.

Canny three-toed sloths know slow

moving. You might deem them smug

as they give branches a hug,

ex-as-per-at-ing-ly slow they move from high to low.

You jump and yell and try to wake them

but deep in sleep slowly they go

swaying in the breeze by their three toes

unheedful of your stratagems— 

they blink—you know they know they know.

published in Asinine Poetry, Feb., 2010

No Meals, No Songs

Unnatural landscapes breed no song,

provide little food for nestlings.

Like blue gum forests in strange lands

yards of aliens yield no songsters.

Insects loiter in native plants

not aliens they cannot digest.

Where no caterpillars devour

live trees and bushes, no birds sing.

Exotic herbs planted for show

live free of bug bites and cocoons,

free of warblers and tanagers

who find no insects to digest.

published in Nature Croons, Apr., 2011

 

 

More poems by Richard Peake:

 

Finding Hidden Beauty

Rock Dusk

They Couldn't Wait

Hello, Winter