Verselove, Day 9: Birds are so smart

Teacher-writers at ethicalela are sponsoring a month of poetry writing.

All educators can join in, too, at this link!

Dixie Keyes prompts us with bird poems today.

On schooldays

I am up before dawn

before birdsong

dressed for work, I

scoop up birdseed

carry it outside,

around the house

to the feeder hanging

from our children’s old

playscape

Rarely do they visit

before I leave for work.

On weekends

I sleep in a bit

fill the feeder just

as the sun fully rounds

the horizon

and watch, from

the kitchen window,

the morning feast.

A cardinal pair

mourning doves

European starlings

and the raucous bluejays

(I bang the window

to scare away

marauding squirrels)

chickadees

house finches

Bewick’s wrens

and my favorites,

the little tufted titmouse.

Sometimes

I can sit on my patio

and they will visit

mere feet away

having learned that

I mean them no harm–

Soul-filling, that trust.