WATERMARK

a poet’s notebook

Established 02004

heron

October 16, 2004

Wildlife Morning

There is a dead snake on the path, bicycle tracks across its body. Two noisy kingfishers fly from the tennis court fence to the river and back again. A blue heron lifts from behind some bushes; passes by me with its awkward grace; turns so that its slate-grey self has a backdrop of brilliant autumn… Continue reading

Critters, Noticed

heron, kingfisher, snake

Ancestral (Artificial )Intelligence

I do not use AI to write. For me, writing is how I think, and I prefer to do it myself. If/when I post anything here that I suspect or know to be AI generated, I will tell you.

I have changed this from Artificial to Ancestral, after Abi Awomosu @ Substack. This medium was made with human history, human thought. All of it, bright and dark. It is ancestral.

Poems

Please do not assume that I am the speaker/ subject of my poems.

In these times of creative nonfiction and fictionalized memoirs, I think of the poem itself as true fiction: it is most likely not factual, but it must be true.

It is likely to be — it is best if it is — a truth I did not know before I wrote, and may not understand even then.

A poem is my way of discovering (dis-covering) what I feel; sometimes, what I think — but it is not necessarily biographical.

heron

Wildlife Morning