Barry Wallenstein

As a young man in 1972, I bought a cabin in the Western Catskills, more or less isolated uphill from a trout stream and surrounded by woods. This was my first extended time away from the sights and sounds, concrete and noise, of the city. I remember being struck and moved by the various sounds of the wind ruffling the leaves. This was a new language for me, and being there, within this new atmosphere, led me to nature poems, mainly those written by others, but finally to my own. My first book (Beast is a Wolf in Brown Fire, 1977) includes poems that reflect this plant-filled, animal rich, fresh air environment. I still like the title poem:

Beast is a Wolf with Brown Fire

runs across meadows

and bounds up into

old farms, now stubbly

and overgrown.

she runs through brush

she rests among the evergreen

and the poplar.

her eyes are pinned to the light

flickering through the leaves.

she pants white mist, she lounges,

she changes sex in the shadows

and emerges in red fire.

the beast is a wolf and

              she goes to you

              she’s found you out,

              my love.

One day I hope to make a poem out of what I, early on, didn’t understand. When I first saw the ants crawling on the buds of the peonies during my first early spring in nature, I had no idea why they were there, so I shook them off. No, I was informed, the ants are helping the peonies to open and flower. Now I imagine the ants communicating with the peonies, and they understand each other.