Drabbling
erasure no. 009
They wet their wings again
Sea fowl chasing flight
Innumerable butterflies
Both night and day
Drabbling in the water.
The world keeps its finest mysteries in the company of ordinary days. It comforts me that someone once loved the world enough to give this moment a name. A bird brushes the water with its wings before climbing into the open air, and an old tongue, unwilling to let such a thing pass unnamed, called it drabbling.
No bird carries the water away with it, yet none leaves unchanged. The ocean keeps its tides, the wing keeps its flight, and each departs having given the other a kindness too ordinary for most eyes to notice. Is this how the Kingdom comes to us, through a world so faithful to its Maker that even a forgotten word becomes a doorway into praise?
There are mornings when the whole earth seems to wait upon the first bird, and the meeting of wing and water belongs to one of those hidden fidelities by which the world has continued since the beginning.
“O Lord, how manifold are your works! In wisdom have you made them all; the earth is full of your creatures.” (Psalm 104:24)
The accompanying photograph is by one of my favorite photographers here on Substack Andy Dean. If you aren’t already familiar with his work, I hope you’ll take a few moments to visit his publication.
I’d love to hear what this erasure brought to mind for you. Share your thoughts in the comments below.
This is part of my ongoing erasure series, where forgotten words are gathered into new meditations through poetry, reflection, and collage. Thank you for reading and walking this path with me.
You can read Erasure No. 007 here:
If you’d like to support my writing and analog collage work, you can buy me a coffee here.
At the foundation of a poet is the responsibility of naming. One of the first duties of Adam was giving all creatures a name. There was poetry in the beginning
Lovely read 🤍