Ted Hughes penned the bear omnipotent;
darkly mountain cached, lurking
bone-crunch fear, an endless descent
to the consummation of death.
The spring bear of Mary Oliver,
with her black fists, her red fire tongue,
is an illumination
of how to love this world.
There is no bear in my land’s scape
but I imagine her emerging
from an opal cave, swatting bass
from a silver billabong, plucking
crimson berries with her velvet mouth.
Mildly, plagued all the while by bush flies,
she shakes her shaggy head.
A full day’s fossick ends when she
rumbles up an acrid methane burp and rests,
back-haunched, in forest dusk. Her small
red eyes swivel on firefly flight.
Which bear is this?
After the seamless, dreamless
encaved months of winter night,
my bear would be that first emerging,
drenched in sunrise,
wide mouthed,
earth summoning,
celebratory
roar.