The magpie and the bowerbird, its odd
predilection unheard of by Marco Polo
when he came upon, high in Badakhshan,
that blue stone-s


embedded glint of pyrites, like the dance
of light on water, or of angels
(the surface tension of the Absolute)
on nothing,


turned, by processes already ancient,
into pigment: ultramarine, brought from
beyond the water it-s the seeming
color of,


and of the berries, blooms and pebbles
finickingly garnishing an avian
shrine or bower with the rarest hue
in nature,


whatever nature is: the magpie-s eye for
glitter from the clenched fist of
the Mesozoic folding: the creek sands,
the mine shaft,


the siftings and burnishings, the ingot,
the pagan artifact: to propagate
the faith, to find the metal, unearth it,
hoard it up,


to, by the gilding of basilicas,
transmute it: O magpie, O bowerbird,
O Marco Polo and Coronado, where do
these things, these


fabrications, come from-the holy places,
ark and altarpiece, the aureoles,
the seraphim-and underneath it all
the howling?