A poet I follow, mostly on his channel (stack?) Poetry Unbound on Substack, is Pádraig Ó Tuama. In his latest post he speaks about Wallace Stevens' excellent poem, Thirteen Ways of Looking at a Blackbird, and the entire genre of poetry it inspired. If you are unfamiliar with the poem you really should search it out.
In his post Pádraig asks: What it is that you feel the need to have 13 ways of looking at?
No need, but it did inspire me to pick a topic and write my own Thirteen Ways poem. Many topics it could be but it might not be a surprise that near the end of the journey of building a cabin I wrote... Thirteen Ways of Looking at a Cabin
I
Tent rings border this cabin
Ancient lives
Also knew the beauty of this place
II
Sawdust coats my face
And slivers hide in my skin
A sore back belies
How much joy building a cabin brings
III
A cabin looks small
Against this land
IV
When the saw stops
Silence begins appropriating
This space
In answer, out before the cabin,
Narwhal exhale
Stars wink on
V
I see the flaws I made
The joint not tight
The moulding covering a mistake
Phoenician flaws
Because the cabin’s beauty
Lies not in perfection
VI
Crossing the river
Ravens circle me
My blackbirds
So stopping on the far side
They also pause
Raucously giving me news
Telling me it wasn’t them
That shit on the cabin’s window
VII
He paddled here,
Nuvumiutaq.
In a qajaq
Made of skin.
Eight hundred years
Before I sought his ghost
Looking out
from a cabin
Made of wood
VIII
Avingaq is my son
And a lemming.
It wonders why
I built a cabin
On it’s meadows.
The lemming.
My son knows.
IX
An iceberg
Blocks the view
The blue
Lights the cabin
And dances.
X
Time slows
On the cabin deck
You can see it in the light
XI
Bare rafters bathed in gold
The entire coast in colour
Pipit calls from the peak
Air is cold but the cabin
Covered in warmth
XII
Hare knows
There is no danger
In my footsteps
On the snowy climb up
He stands stoic
As I reach the cabin
Closing his eyes
As I pass
XIII
The bones of this place
Run deep
To the beginning of time
And the first
To sit where sits the cabin
And watch whales play
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