Avian Inclination

I
When I first heard the thud, I was cooking an omelet.
I made nothing of the noise, at first, brushing it off as a
vicissitude of nature, or perhaps neighbor David, next door.
However, curiosity being what it is, I turned down the burner
and hastened to the back bedroom in time for a second thud;
it was a robin, an eager, energetic robin, a redbreast showing
remarkable avian fortitude in that she kept giving herself up to
the window pane.  A few things crossed my mind immediately,
the foremost being that this poor creature was beset by illness.
But no, no illness--it was, apparently, love, or at least infatuation.

II
I say this because, later that day, she landed on my shoulder.
Such a surreal experience merits more declaration than can be
elicited from my humble pen, yet I dare say it was like the breath
of an angel, then feeling love radiate from that which is inanimate.
I was not completely steady during this application of unexpected
camaraderie, leaning with misstep, though she remained steadfast,
and indeed indicated with a glimmer in her eye what I perceived to be
both joy and amusement.  Moreover, when I drove away, she followed,
alighting on my car at stops and pecking at the window ever so gently,
as if a language of her own was meant for my own understanding.

III
The Giant Eagle grocery store is not far away--less than three miles.
Yet even if it were, I doubt that she would have been deterred, because
she arrived with me, essentially, and upon my entering she swooped by
the automatic door.  She did not enter; instead, she flitted back and forth
alongside the large, rectangular window, gaining the attention of the store
manager--I saw him point.  A few customers opined their two cents worth.
It remained eventful, to be sure, yet not so much as the next day at work,
where she perched out on the window ledge, at one point with a strand
of elderberry vine in her beak, befuddling myself and my office cohorts
but adding to the already abundance of wisecracks at the sake of bird.

IV
Having a robin fancy your every move is flattering, but it is not practical.
I realized I would have to derive a solution, because the robin’s fawning
was becoming second nature, and that nature needed a new direction.
So I hung a bird feeder from the old gum tree out back and filled it with
seed, and I also scattered hay, thin string, and cattail stem alongside
my vegetable garden; even there I left a section, well, for the birds.
I, myself had to spend time there initially, but my plan succeeded;
in time my avian admirer built a nest and lost all interest in me.
I no longer have to worry about further adoration from a robin,
yet I do sometimes find an elderberry vine on my doorstep.


40 Lines
Writer’s Cramp
November 17, 2013