Brad Leithauser
ADDITIONAL BATS
Nightfall loosens them from the rocks
And trees to which like mushrooms
They fasten. Against the clearing's still–
lavender sky, dissolving in
And out of one's sight as fish will
Under the glinting and smoky
Lid of a stream, the bats
Pull to their swarm additional bats.
Theirs seems a gimpy flight, crude
Aerial gallop, yet they live
By hunting on the wing-swoop to strain
The chill night air for food.
Patrolling cries, a vision surer
Than sight, sound the treetops
At clearing's edge, the outcrops
Of stone, the ferns, the dense, standing
Water in the overhung ditch,
And return as rumpled echoes to
Ears that map the field according to
Its shifting, imperfect pitch .
