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Once an endangered species, bald eagles, including at Voyageurs National Park in Minnesota, came roaring back to life. They now confront a new foe: avian flu. —The Washington Post, October 5, 2024 |
Iconic American bald eagle, feathered vigilance,
predatory golden gaze far-focused
across the valley, where coyotes jump-kill
mice and voles. Fur-encased small prey,
meaty morsels for white-headed sea eagles.
Yellow hooked beaks prominent on the Great Seal,
where bald eagles unfurl their wings, a defiant
symbol of the USA. Environmental laws nurtured
these raptors, saved from harms: DDT, hunters,
lead bullets. Biologists lauded their soaring story.
Exaltation for these wide-winged fliers slumps
with the advent of avian influenza. 2021: year
that birds begin to fall from the sky, falling, falling,
across the USA. Now, 2024: talons clench, beaks twist,
wings flail: collapse of iconic bald eagles widespread.
Emblematic birds, do you auger an apocalypse?
Susan J. Wurtzburg received 1st place in the Land of Enchantment Award, 2024, the Save Our Earth Award, 2024, and the Elizabeth M. Campbell Poetry Award, 2022, and was a semi-finalist in the Crab Creek Review Poetry Competition 2022, and in the Naugatuck River Review's 14th Narrative Poetry Contest, 2022. She was a Community Poet in the Spring 2023 Poetry Workshop, Westminster College, Salt Lake City. Wurtzburg is a Commissioned Artist in Sidewalk Poetry: Senses of Salt Lake City, 2024. Her poetry book, Ravenous Words, with Lisa Lucas will appear in spring, 2025.