fileg's flight

I'm not much for resolutions but I've decided to take on as my ongoing goal for 2012

today, I shall be happier than a bird with a frenchfry

Mother Night
by Jim Harrison

When you wake at three AM you don't think
of your age or sex and rarely your name
or the plot of your life which has never
broken itself down into logical pieces.
At three AM you have the gift of incomprehension
wherein the galaxies make more sense
than your job or the government. Jesus at the well
with Mary Magdalene is much more vivid
than your car. You can clearly see the bear
climb to heaven on a golden rope in the children's
story no one ever wrote. Your childhood horse
named June still stomps the ground for an apple.
What is morning and what if it doesn't arrive?
One morning Mother dropped an egg and asked
me if God was the same species as we are?
Smear of light at five AM. Sound of Webber's
sheep flock and sandhill cranes across the road,
burble of irrigation ditch beneath my window.
She said, "Only lunatics save newspapers
and magazines," fried me two eggs, then said,
"If you want to understand mortality look at birds."
Blue moon, two full moons this month,
which I conclude are two full moons. In what
direction do the dead fly off the earth? Rising sun.
A thousand blackbirds pronounce day.



"Mother Night" by Jim Harrison from Saving Daylight.
© Copper Canyon Press, 2007

Sam Hamill:
Black Marsh Eclogue

Although it is midsummer, the great blue heron
holds darkest winter in his hunched shoulders,
those blue-turning-gray clouds
rising over him like a storm from the Pacific.

He stands in the black marsh
more monument than bird, a wizened prophet
returned from a vanished mythology.
He watches the hearts of things
and does not move or speak. But when
at last he flies, his great wings

cover the darkening sky, and slowly,
as though praying, he lifts, almost motionless,
as he pushes the world away.

I just scanned these two pictures from the most recent Fortean Times, and I thought some of you might want them.





They were all orphaned and are being captive raised now. The Ravens are being called Tic, Tac and Toe.

These are destined for my desktops file (my desktop being 1680x1050) so if you have a need for really big copies that haven't been turned into jps for posting, leave me a note.


( bigger versions under the cut )

I just finished reading To See Every Bird on Earth: A Father, a Son, and a Lifelong Obsession by Dan Koeppel

It sounded like a good bet for me, but it turned out to be ... I'm almost embarrassed to say this ... neither fish nor fowl.

While it was interesting enough, it was not what I expected or hoped for. The book is not so much about the travel, adventure or obsession of big list birding as a biography of his father and a dry history of modern birding with the occasional bird sighting used to anchor the the chapters.

His understanding of his father's need to build a giant life list eventually served as a means of father and son coming to - well, actually I hesitate to say understand each other, but to find some common ground to rebuild their connection. Perhaps if there had been any indication that either father or son actually *liked* the birds, I would have liked it better.


There is one incident that I thought some of you would find interesting. In a section about how difficult it is to have some sightings verified, they talk about a young birder who reported seeing the Ivory-billed Woodpecker (round about 2000.) This led to various recordings being made in the area, one of which seemed to verify that distinct tok-tok call. The expert dismissed this as distant gunfire, and the consensus was basically that the sighting was a well intentioned mistake as you can't see an extinct bird in it's old range. I'm wondering how they feel about that now!