Patron Poet of San Francisco

SAN FRANCISCO--I'm cheating, a little, to include poetry from others, since that way I don't have to compose my own, but this one expresses a view dear to the heart of the Wandering Naturalist, and it comes from St. Francis of Assisi, the patron saint of my new home town:

DOES EVERY CREATURE HAVE A SOUL?

A tool
in your hand I am, dear God,
the sweetest instrument you have shaped my being into.

What makes me now complete--
feeling the soul of every creature against
my heart.

Does every creature have a
soul?

Surely they do; for anything God has touched
will have life
forever,

and all creatures He
has held.

--St. Francis of Assisi, translated by Daniel Ladinsky in Love Poems from God

Spring Scream of the Seagull

ALCATRAZ--

We will take the Parade Ground.
We will storm the Industries.
Now is the season of our discontent.
Now is our cry for blood and for love.

He who has experience rules the roost.
She who is savvy runs the road.
We congregate on the roof
And rest on the cisterns.
We name and claim our bits of earth
And woe to invader, human or bird,
Who tries to dislodge us.

Not that we’ve forgotten how to take to the air—
We rise en masse to protest predacious acts!
How glorious to rule the sky: Poor people,
Who don’t know how good it feels
To crap in midair, I pity you.
You who are a little lower than the angels
May learn, perhaps, this summer
That it is better to give than to receive.