American Life in Poetry
by Ted Kooser, U.S. Poet Laureate
Here David Wagoner, a distinguished poet living in Washington state, vividly describes a peacock courtship, and though it's a poem about birds, haven't you seen the males of other species, including ours, look every bit as puffed-up, and observed the females' hilarious indifference?
Peacock Display
He approaches her, trailing his whole fortune, Perfectly cocksure, and suddenly spreads The huge fan of his tail for her amazement.
Each turquoise and purple, black-horned, walleyed quill Comes quivering forward, an amphitheatric shell For his most fortunate audience: her alone.
He plumes himself. He shakes his brassily gold Wings and rump in a dance, lifting his claws Stiff-legged under the great bulge of his breast.
And she strolls calmly away, pecking and pausing, Not watching him, astonished to discover All these seeds spread just for her in the dirt.
Reprinted from Best of Prairie Schooner: Fiction and Poetry, University of Nebraska Press, 2001, by permission of the author, whose most recent book is Good Morning and Good Night, University of Illinois Press, 2005. This weekly column is supported by The Poetry Foundation, The Library of Congress, and the Department of English at the University of Nebraska, Lincoln. This column does not accept unsolicited poetry.
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