Birds Above the Abyss

Midfield

I want to tell you about the birds, the ones I’ve been watching for months now, as closely as I’ve ever watched anything. There is a stillness when I watch them—their presence demands mine. But there is everything else, too. What stirs in them stirs in me, emotions that fall beyond the reach of language.

It started with desire. For years, I’d wanted to know the names of birds, to be able to identify them. To know things, we must start with learning their names. Only then can we unlearn the names and understand the thing being experienced, as well as the thing doing the experiencing—that thing we call the self.

A pair of binoculars arrived in the mail this fall, along with a set of bird identification flashcards. Both were gifts from my partner. I spliced memorizing the cards with staring out my window through the binoculars. My days were woven in this way: memorize, stare, memorize, stare. I ran my fingers over the birds’ printed forms while saying their names. Fox sparrow. House sparrow.1 Lark sparrow. White-throated sparrow. I had no idea there were so many sparrows. At first, my yard only offered up house sparrows. Eventually, a pair of white-throated sparrows arrived and dazzled me with their black-and-white helmets. Thrilled that I could identify them, I screamed their name in the style of a blue jay’s alarm call: “White-throated sparrow! White-throated sparrow!” The soundwaves my voice created hit the glass in front of me. The pane indifferently refracted the vibrations.

My world swelled after I realized there was more than one type of sparrow. How crude was my perception that I had lumped so many species into one? I widened my search from my backyard to area parks, meadows, tallgrass prairies, wetlands, and wildlife refuges waiting for the quiet to be parted by a sound akin to a flutist trilling while playing wind tones on her instrument. No note, just the airy pairing of consonants amplified by the flute’s long silver body. “Trrrrrr, trrrrrr.” The trills lasted a few seconds, long enough for a sparrow to move from the meadow to a nearby tree, or from a blade of grass to the water, or simply to move away from me. “Trrrrrr, trrrrrr.” A scramble of wings. Most of the time, I saw no more than a smear of color, like someone swiping oil paints with his thumb. Then nothing. Silence returned. It was a companion, this silence. I came to feel as if both of us were waiting for another bird to stir—to relieve my disquiet and to relieve silence of the burden of being silence.

Not every sparrow was a smear. I saw my first savannah sparrows at Heritage Park, where they foraged in patchy grass near an old brick silo. Like an accent color used sparingly, yellow patches above their eyes elevated their otherwise drab appearance. I first saw Harris’s sparrows at the Tallgrass Prairie Nature Preserve. They scurried into a group of shrubs as my partner and I drove past. They seemed to pose as I trained my binoculars on them. One had the darkest face and crown of any Harris’s sparrow I’ve seen so far, features that would ensure a high rank among his quarrel. The wheat-colored spots on either side of his head made him look like he was wearing earmuffs.

I saw white-crowned sparrows for the first time at the preserve where I saw the Harris’s sparrows. They were part of a flutter mobbing the feeder outside the educational center. My first fox sparrow surprised me at Longview Lake. I hadn’t heard its trill as it left the meadow, but suddenly it poked its head out of an evergreen just above me. “This is the red sparrow,” I thought. “Red, red, red. Red like the fox.” That was the same day we saw a rangy coyote on the side of the highway. How slow the animal seemed, how sapless, a stark contrast to the birds in the meadow.

Loess Bluffs National Wildlife Preserve gave me my first song sparrows. My first chipping sparrows hugged the water at the KCP&L Wetlands, a visit that was also notable because of the racist and anti-Semitic graffiti someone had carved into the bird blind at the wetland’s entrance.

Baker Wetlands offered up the shy Le Conte’s sparrow, whom I happened upon as I was taking a photo of the switchgrass next to a mowed path. He balanced between two blades, one foot on each, exposing his blond breast and white belly. He sang, but I don’t remember his song. I was overcome by his beauty: his soft gold face and striped crown, the patchwork of browns on his back that reminded me of the mottling on a hawk, his cocked tail. I was also overcome with how blithe he seemed, surfing in the grass, body shifting and shifting again in the air. “Alive,” I thought. “This bird is alive, through and through.” I had been reading about the Le Conte’s sparrow the day before visiting Baker, though I didn’t make the connection until later. What I read described them as being difficult to see because of their secretive nature. The phrase “secretive nature” made it sound like the Le Conte’s was a gumshoe, a spy, or worse—nothing like the glib creature I had encountered.

Lake Perry is not where I had my first or even second American tree sparrow sighting, but it is here where I had my most meaningful experience with them. I found them where the edge of the lake fed a small inlet. There, surrounded by trees, the tree sparrows (and a few song sparrows) pulsed and trundled at the water’s edge like sprites. They were bathing, and I was watching without their knowledge. I’d crept across a rough-shorn field and made my way through unkempt trees to bear witness to this ritual. All along the section of the shore, as well as in the inlet, sparrows bobbled, sending a volley of water droplets in every direction. I’d never seen anything more joyful, and that joy found its way into my body. “This little world,” I thought. “What have I been missing?” I felt like I’d been born the wrong size. The human-sized world was not nearly as enchanting as this Lilliputian one.

Not unlike the Le Conte’s sparrow, I am becoming more secretive as I watch birds. I skulk about in their world, which has no need for me. I move slowly. I crouch. I crawl. I sit motionless with my legs crossed until parts of my body go numb. I stand looking out and out, seemingly at nothing. My partner makes line drawings of the landscape as he waits for me. Or he listens to podcasts. Or he goes on walks that loop back to where he will find me, still sitting or standing in the same place.

But I am not in the same place. The stillness, the watching—and what I am watching—is changing me in ways that words can’t properly express. Basho’s come close:

Midfield,
attached to nothing,
the skylark singing.

Perhaps that’s it, or at least part of it. The birds are attached to nothing. I am attached to nothing. There we are, held together by the field, singing with life.

—

I just learned that house sparrows aren’t actually sparrows. They’re weaver finches.

Cabinet of Curiosities

My neighbor’s back porch looks like a cabinet of curiosities.

Note from an eBird user: American tree sparrow seen near artificial flowers at roadside memorial.

Church bells in the morning. Train whistle at night.

I follow a falling leaf almost all the way to the ground before realizing it’s not a bird.

The day is a glass marble being rolled toward the light.

Cardinal: You glow like a ruby in a tarnished ring.

A tree grows inside an old silo.

We just rescued a yellow-rumped warbler who was stuck in a park toilet.

American robin: You look like a stone fruit.

Spurred by a crow’s alert, more than thirty cedar waxwings shook off the Bradford pear in which they had flickered and lolled.

Meadowlarks bound through a freshly cut field as if directing a singalong.

Brown creeper: You look like a small knot on this Brobdingnagian tree.

In the quiet field, flying sparrows sound like cards being riffle-shuffled.

Western meadowlark: You’ve thrown your drab office blazer over your couture evening dress.

I look up to see the birds in my yard flying between bubbles. I look over to see a neighbor and her child playing with a soap bubble machine.

Canada goose: On takeoff, your wings sound like umbrellas opening and closing at full tilt.

Chickadee at Old Longview Lake: Your deformed foot doesn’t keep you from vaulting like an aerialist.

I saw an orange house finch today. I think this is the fellow who sings me awake each morning.

The blue jays seem to be testing shell peanuts for weight before making their selections.

Twenty-eight robins just landed in my sweetgum tree.

Two house sparrows fight over a feather.

Evening: The birds darken.

Two Carolina wrens hunt for spiders in my silver maple’s trunk flares.

This is the best thing I’ve read all day: Carolina wrens defend their territories with constant singing.

Brambled

You do your thing. I’ll watch birds.

Life is like being held hostage by someone I don’t want to leave.

I will give you four names because you change with each season.

Platinum sky. Church bells. A robin reflected in the birdbath.

I’m trying to forget people.

My poems are as brambled as my mind.

I avoid showing you the things I love because I am afraid you will not love them.

We rake leaves while leaves fall.

A bald eagle flew right over my head today.

American tree sparrows look like my grandmother’s embroidery.

Windy day. An American kestrel clutches the top of a purple martin house.

Four drops of oil glint at the top of an oak tree. The European starlings have arrived.

Sweet wren. You only come out when I’m standing near the feeder. I’m beginning to think you like my company.

We followed a murmuration of starlings along a country road. It pulsed open and closed—a world expanding and collapsing.

Bagging leaves, we make way for winter.

We’ve had our driest fall in fifteen years, which has affected our wetlands. It’s raining this morning. I’m off to kiss the raindrops.

Red-bellied woodpecker: In this light, you are wearing a faded clown costume.

Northern flicker: Your spotted belly mirrors the sweetgum seed pods dangling behind you.

When I’m still, the birds stop seeing me.

The rain was light and inconsequential. Clay hardens beneath my feet.

No-God

There is no god, and no-god visited me today in the form of a red-tailed hawk.

I said to the hawk, “Please forgive us for what we’ve done. We know not our ignorance.” Then I repeated it, but in first-person singular.

Rust-colored bars trailed down his chest like seismic waves recorded sideways.

Stingrays swam down the centers of lightest feathers on his back.

The shafts of his primaries were pencil leads.

His talons were crude and comical, like those a child would sculpt in art class, having never seen a hawk in real life.

His eyes were chocolate brown. Watching him blink was like watching two worlds appear and disappear.

When he scratched his neck, his lower beak dangled, loose and wobbling.

Over a period of about fifteen minutes, he let me slink right up to the low-slung branch where he was perched.

He did not fly away when I approached. He did a little jig on the branch, then turned to face me.

His chest was on full display, propped up by those two ridiculous Big Bird feet.

He did a hula move, fluffing his feathers against the cold. Now he was just showing off.

He said nothing, of course, but what I heard was: “This is what I am. Do not destroy me.”

Slowly, he opened his wings and flew away, carrying the day’s last light on his back.

A Desolating Experience

I wish birds could read. Then I’d have my preferred audience.

T. H. White wrote about nature because he didn’t fit in with people. Same.

Humans are the only species to which I have fallen prey.

Strong wind. Crackling house. A conversation.

Thorns and seeds in glass jars. A tackle box packed with toys. Two journals: one practical, one desperate. These will remain when I’m gone.

I just learned that blue jays are the architects of America’s oak forests. Amazing.

The wind tonight is straight out of The Turin Horse.

Every leaf a bird. Every bough a bird. Bird, the wind. Bird, the air. Motion before thought is the bird inside you—scratch marks on stone.

Winter is when I cry a little every night, mostly about the suffering of animals.

Canada geese glide through the air’s church bells.

As I learn the names of birds, I am forgetting the names of people.

I know some birds by their shadows.

Some people feel like glue traps.

The day after Donald Trump won the election, I walked into a canyon.

I’m not sure what all the American robins were doing in my backyard this afternoon, but it appeared to be some sort of flash mob.

We got the tube feeder and heated birdbath set up just in time for winter. New visitors include cedar waxwings and black-capped chickadees.

This morning, I saw a squirrel sitting like Buddha at the base of my sweetgum tree.

When the last mourning dove disappeared, I was more alone than ever.

Destroyed

I saw my first-ever red-shouldered hawk today. We watched each other for a long time.

I saw the red-shouldered hawk where the brook and meadow meet. Part of me is still there.

I found where the killdeer go at night.

The internet is screwed. Take up birding.

I went outside to find the blue jay who was imitating a hawk. Instead, I saw a red-tailed hawk shoot out of my sweetgum tree.

There’s a northern flicker nesting in my silver maple.

Why am I so happy? Because I’m destroyed.

Suddenly, the air is snow-colored.

Nostalgia, you are a leaking window.

Like finials, mourning doves embellish my fence on this otherwise unadorned day.

I saw an eastern bluebird in my yard today. I SAW AN EASTERN BLUEBIRD IN MY YARD TODAY.

I found two nests in the silver maple.

Two doors down, a boy rides his toy tractor through the leaves.

My advice? Find some earth. Walk on it, slowly.

You can find me in the wetlands, but that’s not an invitation to come find me.

Night. A moth at my window. Hello.

I lost my curse words in the woods.

How I look when I see birds is not how I look when I see people.

Human Contact

I saw a sign that read, “Ring Bell for Human Contact.” I did not ring the bell.

When shade turns to sun, dark-eyed juncos are the first to emerge from the brush.

After several dark days, the sun coming through this window might as well be a god.

When I was filling the birdbath, a blue jay did his best impression of a red-tailed hawk. I think he wanted to bathe all by himself.

The male cardinal is a grace note in the bare rose of Sharon.

A highway runs through one of our wetland areas. Shame on us.

A shadow crosses the highway. Above, a red-tailed hawk.

You know you’re going to die, and you live anyway. That’s how it is.

I have edited the landscape to include more detritus.

The last leaves on the crabapple tree: ornaments.

I only answered the door because I thought you were a bird.

Unordered list: waxing crescent moon, bare maple tree, dull opal sky.

The remaining leaves sound like dry grasses.

Black Friday. I can’t get to the wetlands fast enough.

The snow geese fly in the shape of a swallow.

Scatter my ashes in the prairie cordgrass.

Four red-tailed hawks soar above our subdivision.

Starlings carry the shape of power lines into the air.

Death won’t happen to me. I won’t be there. – Jose Faus

Secretive Nature

I want to upcycle Congress into an old-growth forest.

My bird name would be the beaver-toothed ruminator.

I’m pretty sure the geese don’t call this place Kansas.

Starlings perch on power lines above the trainyard.

I just read about a type of sparrow that has a “secretive nature.” Intriguing.

One squirrel munches on an acorn while the others kuk and quaa over a Cooper’s hawk.

The great horned owl is out hunting on our street today. Between him and the Cooper’s hawk, the crows and blue jays are raising a racket.

Today, I saw the sparrow described as having a “secretive nature.” What a beauty.

I’m just here for the beauty.

No killdeer across the street. For now, the new development has won.

The recycling truck’s brakes sing like a forlorn bird.

One of the functions of language is to facilitate the creation of memories. Once we have memory, we have a past and a presumed future.

Language is not how we experience the world. It’s how we editorialize about our experiences.

As soon as I say “hawk,” I am no longer experiencing the hawk.

There’s a lot of goose poo on my shoe. I don’t know what to do.

Yesterday, I followed a kestrel through a small field.

Talk about theories all you like, but when it rains, go outside.

In place of leaves, red-winged blackbirds.

The pied-billed grebe’s white stomach shimmers like an ostrich egg.

Erratics

I love the maple more because of the cardinal, and I love the cardinal more because of the maple.

Black cattle rise from the ground like basalt erratics in a limestone world.

You do feel alive. You just don’t like how that feels.

What is an extra hour in sky-time?

It’s as if the entire red maple has become the female cardinal, a form of reverse camouflage.

Dropping conditioning is, in itself, a form of conditioning.

Shhh. The squirrels are napping.

Water that reflects the sky is full of sky.

The juncos are wonderful company this time of year.

My love of birds started years ago when I released a starling from my father’s trap.

I came home to a Cooper’s hawk perched on my fence.

I think it was a sharp-shinned hawk. And I think a blue jay imitated the alarm cry of a Cooper’s hawk when the sharp-shinned hawk arrived. (Update: This accipiter was later identified as a very young female Cooper’s hawk, so the blue jay used the right call after all.)

Two great horned owls appear to be competing for territory in our neighborhood.

These days with birds are magical.

I woke to ice in the birdbath and a mantle of apricot leaves in the still-green lawn.

I topped the birdbath off with water that wasn’t frozen. Within minutes, dozens of birds came to get a drink or take a bath.

I live between two flyways, so there is a lot of interesting stuff going on here birdwise.

I just saw a yellow-bellied sapsucker in our backyard. A downy woodpecker and a red-bellied woodpecker were back there, too.

I’m ready for my arms to serve as branches.

My neighbor is walking down the street with a large shamanic drum.

Every night, the sky turns into a stigmatic, bleeding from sudden wounds.

The birds have entered my dreams, pale and wandering.

Red Birds

Church bells, and two mourning doves flying toward them.

These birds are using me for my birdbath.

A blue jay flew up to my kitchen window and looked at me as if to say, Do you want your life to be wild, or do you want it to be precious?

I am a screen for the shadows of birds.

The birds are the sky’s shadow puppets.

Now a butterfly is at my window. And a stink bug.

On Nextdoor, my neighbors are trying to pair monarch caterpillars with the milkweed plants they need to survive.

Today is a long drive behind a garbage truck.

I am thankful for trees, which provide homes for so many animals.

On the water, twisted leaves look like origami swans.

Fall: An American white pelican circles a small lake in Kansas.

Nostalgia: missing the bald eagles I saw yesterday.

My fingers are still purple from cutting fresh beets.

I love a red bird on a brown fence.

It’s enough to hear the songbird. I don’t turn my head.

Earlier, I saw an old man carrying a large stuffed dog. I like your dog, I said. Don’t touch him, he replied.

Suffering is a dwelling with a large doorway but very little interior space.

The female cardinal is the color of the red maple’s turning leaves.