This talk takes examples of Abū al-ʿAlāʾ al-Maʿarrī’s (363–449/973–1057) use of animal imagery—doves, crows, camels—to conduct an exploration of the themes of mourning, longing, and of poetry itself in his first diwan, Saqṭ al-Zand (First Sparks of the Tinder). It seeks to explore the interplay of onomatopoeia, etymology, and myth in the creative process whereby al-Maʿarrī decodes and refigures the Arabic poetic tradition to create a distinctive Late ʿAbbāsid metapoetics.