by Paul Lindholdt

Among pebbles of the streambed it dips and prods,

now underwater, wings stretched for balance

against the flow, turning over stones

where small insects hide, darting there and there

after them, clutching the bottom as though

on a vertical slide, swept back then climbing forward

again, a liquid shuttle grooming the streambed,

loosening debris that swirls into the current,

still underwater, still prying, a squat gray genius

of balance, voiceless and single-minded,

perpetually hungry, never stepping twice on the same

stone, a dipper plunging to seize larva, always

bobbing and searching for food in the flux

of its home, the current sliding past

thin, clear and insistent, the beak probing

between toes, wings clinging, now breaking

the surface to light on a spruce branch

where it rests and drips the wings.

Paul Lindholdt is a professor at Eastern Washington University whose work has been recognized by the Academy of American Poets, the Society of Professional Journalists, and the Washington Center for the Book. His current book-in-progress, his eleventh, has a working title Sacraments of the Flesh.