A Sporting Summer

The sport is almost over
and its been better than good.

Superlatives are long worn out
and we can only sit and stare.

The energy and power
the motives and determination

are beyond the knowing
of lesser minds.

Today we saw a legend
and he came through again.

Then he cried
and he laughed

and we all clapped
....and marvelled.

Summer's End

The starling has gone
and so has the summer.

It was fast this year
and I wanted it to last.

I went away - new places and people
didn't want to return,
but I knew when I did it would all be okay.

And it was.

I sit here listening and then
I peer outside and see
high up on the telegraph pole
a sun drenched eagle surrounded by sparrows.

They make a noise and he doesn't care.
He waits patiently and silently.
The noise goes on
and then suddenly he stretches his enormous wings and
floats from his perch on an invisible cloud
that carries him over the moor.

Yes, its okay to be back.

Rose Coloured Starling

He came from Hungary
or so they said.
I wonder how long it took.

He seems to like island life
but not so much his neighbours.
He snaps and shrieks,
attacks at will,
chasing even gulls away.

And then he sits and looks around
puffing his pink chest out proudly.

Blackbirds peer around the gatepost
wary, wanting to share the guarded feast.
But there is no quarter given.
This foreigner wants to keep it all.
He doesn't eat -
just watches.

I hope he'll stay but
I know he won't.
It'll soon be time to find his way home.
He was welcomed here and he
rested.
But most of all he was spared
the horrors of being the twitchers' prey.

On Ormaclete Beach

The sea picked up it's skirts and ran,
leaving silver strands behind,
and pebbles nestling in the sand
for tiny turnstones to find.

Night Visitor

The silence is tranquil.
Eyes close gently and I feel
a soft breath beside me as my friend sleeps.

Then a sound.
I listen.
I try to decipher
then nothing.

Eyes close.
The quiet sleeping of my friend
does not disturb me.
The sound comes again -
a distant rasp of a click clack.

Click clack; trick track, brick brack;
Ceaseless, getting louder.

I lie awake
A smile pulls at the edges of my mouth.
Sleep is no longer important because I want to listen.

I know this sound.
I stay awake
revelling in the privilege
of sharing the night with
an insomniac corncrake.

The Blackbird's Wing.

A bee hovers
humming quietly
as it flirts with a rose.

I sit,
patient,
waiting
to hear the swallow sing
and see the dappled sunlight on a blackbird's wing.

Something New

The promise of something new hangs in the air.
Will I grasp it?

I think I might
but what will become of the past.
Can I take it with me or
would that be wrong.

I shall wait
and wonder.
Its happy time waiting.
My friend waits with me.