Egrets in Beersheva


What language is it
in which egret feathers
mean purity?  In which —
my friend swears it —
Isaiah’s scarlet sins
go white as egret
feathers, not as snow?
Isaiah could so easily
have mentioned egrets —
I saw them in Beersheva,
crowding out the trees,
each slender, graceful
torso white as snow,
so many I thought
the trees would
topple over.  Though
it was summer, they
seemed to have no
leaves, just slender,
graceful arcs of blameless
snow, which made,
I have to admit,
an absolute racket.
But, surely, it was
that ecstatic noise
that got me — for
once — to lift my eyes,
the very sound Isaiah’s
voice was after:
though your sins be
scarlet, they shall be
white as the egrets
in these trees, but then
he was afraid he’d
divulged his secret:
his immaculate source
wasn’t God at all, but
fleet, white arrows
slashing the heavens,
divvying the clouds
among the startled trees,
snow-white feathers
flying as they’d go.
He crossed out “egret”
and wrote “snow.”