The Great Blue Heron of Basho’ Pond

The Great Blue Heron of Basho’ Pond

Sunday and Roshi began his discourse;
  “Who has seen the Great Blue Heron of Basho’ Pond?”
An uncommon challenge, his sparing us
  The usual inscrutable old Chinese Koan

For days after I could only imagine
  That magical avian demigod,
Likely more Pokemon than bird,
  Its blue feathers coating the sky,
Its phoenix godhead blazing to burn away the
  False facades of Nature,
In itself, the more I imagined, deeply ornate,
  Flying in MC Escher tessellations,
Iconic and mystifying,,
  Heart of its own Tibetan Mandala  

Thought I, dreaming on, ignoring,
  Tibetans build their Mandalas of sand,
Working sometimes months in detail,
  Only to ceremonially brush all away

Until I met the Heron, and it asked me,
  “What are you doing here?” and
“Get you to market and earn your keep!”
  That’s what an iconic Heron says

See, our ‘Basho’s pond’ was a real pool,
  Swamped out behind an earthen bridge up the hill,
Made with dirt leftover from when
  Bulldozers leveled the baseball field
And dammed the mountain stream,
  The lot was once a summer camp

Sitting on that bridge,
  Patience and time always dissolve my constructions,
I saw it walk out from the swamp bottom,
  Punks and reeds,
It wore a mange, it watched back its shadow,
  Throat twitching as it practiced to swallow
Basho’s popcorn tadpoles, which
   Surely he’d come up from the river for

All in all, just an ordinary bird,
  Defying Old Roshi’s grand gestures and words,
Molting feathers testified to a true physique
  That relieved me of all excessive mystique,
In skinny yellow boots,
  Standing knee deep in the creek,
Pointing his beak to where today
  Are all the heavens we need seek

After my scolding he flew off,
  Back to the Esopus, no doubt

I also saw Basho’s Mink, carried
  A green frog in his mouth,
     Frog legs for dinner -
        (mizu no oto)