Thread: wing's black whispers

wing's black whispers

a huge crow, egg-weighted
bends a pine bough
high and raucous

syrup and gel coalesce
peck and shoulder gooey walls
sucked by light and breath
sprawl limp on twiggy floor
hungry to dissolve soiled flesh
into wing's black whispers
and morning's rude cries.

Hey, man. I like crows. They're mysterious little buggers. Friendly in some ways, but a little threatening too.

I like the way it reads, but you pretty much always seem to have that licked. Really like things like "high and raucous" -- when just a couple of words provide a clear image -- with sight and sound. If there is something deeper, I'm not getting it. But at face value, it's just a sharp little read.

Nice work!

The only line in this that bothered me was

sucked by light and breath

It is somewhat pretty. But other than that it didn't do much for me. The only image I could grasp onto with it was the baby taking food out of the mothers mouth, and with different words a much better connection could be made. I don't know if that was the image I was even spose to latch onto. Other than that ?

I enjoyed this read, and the thoughts that presented themselves to me from it.

Sounds like a circle of life. I'm seeing the crow scavenging what is sprawled on the twiggy floor. Crows really are some of the most raucous and rude sounding birds, aren't they?

JB: yeah, they are trickster birds. One huge one landed above me. Its butt looked fat so I figured it was pregnant. Funny to think one day that egg, or at least its contents, would be flying after that mother.

Maggie: the hatchling is shouldering its way through the wall of the shell into the light and its first breath. I wanted to give the sense that not only was the impetus to live coming from the interior (the chick) but also a kind of pull from the larger world outside. The food would be the 'soiled flesh'- worms, roadkill. Pleased that you enjoyed.

Gumby: the circle of life for sure. amazing that the guck inside the egg ends up eating worms to fly.

thanks all for the read and comments

I found this very astute, J.R., and appreciated it deeply. I've cared for more bald baby sparrows (I suppose infant crows aren't much different) than I care to recount, first as a child, and then as the Mom my kids expected to make everything right. Most passed, but if left with their mothers, surely they would have had a better chance. The world is unkind, as your last line depicts. You've captured the birthing brilliantly.

I liked this little nature piece. Put the picture across well.

lisa: It is lovely you have shared that vein of nature (however unkind) with your children, and presumably with your own mother as well. Perhaps our dubious claims to superiority as a species rest largely on the fact that we can, and sometimes do, choose to be kind.