Night Heron Maybe

By Fred Marchant Fred Marchant

I woke to more rain, and felt in the dark

for how wet the sill was, then rolled back

to my radio, and a midnight preacher

in my earphone teaching about sin.

I learned that punishment would come

like lightning that surprises an innocent shore.

Thunder would follow me all my days,

stern reminder and sharp rebuke.

The long, sleek, and pointed call

that rose, as if in response, out of the estuary

of night and storm, said it knew well

what the given world gave, and wanted more.

Source: The Looking House (Graywolf Press, 2009)

Biography

Fred Marchant's most recent book of poetry, The Looking House (Graywolf Press, 2009) was named by Barnes & Noble Review as one of the five best books of poetry in 2009. The San Francisco Chronicle picked it as one of the ten best collections of poetry, and the Massachusetts Book Award committee listed as one of the “must reads” of the past year. Janette Currie, writing in Pleiades, has written that “Marchant’s great achievement . . .

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