Icelandic Vademecum

(rhyme to remember quaint bird and place names by)

Exultant birds and free,
darts flying over field and sea.

Wild wings in arctic skies,
sweet poetry of movement, art that versifies.

An aviary music spreads a canvas wide
from far horizon to the mountainside.

The migratory kittiwake and arctic tern
each year to breed on rocks and cliffs return.

Snipes nest in Bredafjördur’s isle Flatey,
white seagulls whirl high over Akureyri bay,

At Húsavík plump puffins feed all day and night
on eel and capelin with furious appetite.

In Jökulsárlón glacial opaline swift skuas pirouette
not far from tourists with iphones and internet.

Gyrfalcons take at Dimmuborgir hearty prey,
swans swim at Skútustadir by Mývatn on the way.

The mighty Jökulsá á Fjöllum flows to roaring Dettifoss,
where Thor hurls thunder down the canyon green with moss.

On horseshoe cliffs by Ásbyrgi greyarctic fulmars nest,
birch, willow, mountain ash afford ptarmigan rest.

In Lagarfljót near Egilsstaðir soaks a water snake,
young cousin of elusive Nessy, undulating in the lake.

The white-tailed eagle-- resident and king--
glides over fjords and bays when harvesting.

Black guillemots and cormorants reside year-round,
their compact colonies on barren reefs abound.

Near mystic Snaefellsnes seals frolic next to eider duck,
while gannets dive for fish as arrows toward their luck.

Below the icecaps Askja, Hekla, Kafla, Krafla, Laki lies
mysterious magma, magic fire under glacial ice.

Birds sense volcanic tremors with some ease,
yet Eyjafjallajökull ash choked flying flocks of geese.

Like the Mauritian Dodo was the great Icelandic auk undone.
Near Eldey isle a bronze evokes the flightless auk, forever gone.

Sandpipers scurry over blackened beaches,
life renewing in Heimaey’s lava reaches.

Petra’s iridescent stones surprise at Stödvarfjördur:
agate, amethyst, obsidian, jasper gild the arbor.

Þingvellir -- where democratic heritage goes on display:
Here Odin’s ravens guard the Althing day by day.

Blithe spirits hover over us, soar to infinity
in radiant spectacle of aviary artistry!