We are Mary Oliver’s snow geese

when you see us, see us –

it may be enough for any life

We are Seamus Heaney’s father’s spade

digging gravelly ground

down and down to healing wells

We are Dylan Thomas’s young and easy days

under simple stars

and the moon always rising

And, of course, we are Mary McLeod’s sparrows

singing by your lintel in the heather-scented morning

and at night, when your pillow is a loch of tears