I scatter seed
small birds gather
pieces of my heart.
— C.Birde, 2/23
Heartfound — A Poem
Winter Blues — a Poem
Oh, falling sky – pieces of blue
tipped black & white & falling
Crying bright reply to peanuts
clacking against dark shingles
& rattling aluminum gutters,
white painted.
Jay-filled sky in blue shadows
falling toward my outstretched
hand, emptied now, but hope-
fueled.
— C.Birde, 12/22
Caged — A Dream
Uninvited,
unexpected, they arrive…
Four men – stocky & absurd,
frowning in black overcoats
& bowler hats.
Crowding into the bathroom.
Bearing, between them,
a large birdcage –
ornate wire, curled & domed.
On one perch,
a red-gold parrot;
on its twin,
a second parrot’s skeleton;
& on the cage’s floor,
a lovebird contained,
restrained,
in a cube of wire mesh.
“We done did the best we could.”
Muttering,
shuffling, the men depart as,
tumbling from its perch,
the parrot falls,
flashing red-over-gold…
The lovebird remains…
Love,
trapped —
caged within
a cage.
— C.Birde, 12/22
Winter Prelude — A Poem
The snowbirds
have returned –
those flitting,
avian shadows,
bow-tie tailed
& dapper;
flown in on
the new moon’s
dark veil
to releaf
the beeches’ bare,
uplifted boughs
in monochrome
& song.
— C.Birde, 11/22
Sparrow — A Poem
Upon
a bed of seeds,
she rests,
folded within
the blue globe’s
hollow,
cracks open
striped hulls
& eats
But,
at my approach,
a l a r m –
shell fragments
scatter
She seeks escape,
rehatches
her small self
on wings
unfurled,
stretched
o u t.
— C.Birde, 11/22
Wood Thrush Wood — A Poem
Hands clasped
& pressed
to breast-
bones,
we stood –
enraptured –
as Wood Thrush
dropped
each liquid note
down through
the trees’ canopy –
like hope,
like light –
then alit
upon the path
before us
& took
his unassuming
bow.
— C.Birde, 6/22
Transformations — A Dream
I, a white-masked cipher curled
above the rusted pump within
old wisteria’s protective weave
& tangle,
I, a shadow leaning out beyond
the curtain of dry shadows’ twist
(feel the subtle separating prick
of pinfeathers’ growth forming
& transforming)
My bent neck lengthening from
hoary vines’ obscuring traceries
to better see beyond the mask’s
silk-ribbon-tassled boundaries
through soft-tumbled dark,
Two girls rapidly approaching,
two pairs of eyes wide-open
in faces upward tilting, &
two pairs of small hands lifting,
cupped & empty,
(to be filled? or hopeful offering?)
I, stretching further from wisteria
above the pump’s fixed drip drip
dripping to peer, beak-mouthed,
at splayed moth-pink palms
My auriculars hearing the voice
that scolds & calls from whence
the two girls emanated
My own clear-sighted eyes blinking,
behind the white mask seeing
their reluctant turning,
small hands falling slack against
their sides like dimmed clusters
fading
My cipher-self retreating to roost
concealed from undesired view
in wisteria’s curtaining tangle,
as the Scold approaches,
Folding new-feathered wing-arms
long against ribs & hips
(mid-transformation)
Reaching keen, claw-taloned tips
back toward the coverts of upper-
& undertails,
toward stub-tailfeathers’ oh-so-slow
inevitable forming
I, receding back into embracing
shadow & vines’ hushed rustling
while the abandoned pump drip
drip drips in trickle diminished,
yet always, ever flowing.
— C.Birde, 3/22
Peregrine — A Poem
Peregrine scrawls
with wingtip, cry, & talon,
inscribes blue-breasted
sky
in spirals
of concentric pattern,
dives,
drives Red-tail,
with outsized insistence,
persistently
a – w – a – y.
— C.Birde, 3/22
Blue Jay — A Poem
Blue Jay relays
news
of his poor
bruised
broken heart,
mewing
from oak tree’s
boughs…
Abide,
empyreal cousin –
the morrow stirs
with hope
of Spring.
— C.Birde, 3/22
Lullaby — An Image
“Your small cousins
have composed
a new lullaby…”
She shifted
beneath
snowy blankets.
“Let’s sing…
Together…”
— C.Birde, 1/22