Garden Birds

A great spotted woodpecker hangs on the bark
of a birch tree and hammers till its dark;
siskins on rowan twigs quiver with desire,
coal tits fall on fat balls hung on garden wire.

Slack-jawed jackdaws conspiring on the branches;
barreling starlings in diving avalanches
swooping through the garden, following their leaders
attacking, beaks smacking, descending on the feeders.

Half-inching chaffinches pecking at the cages
of the peanut dispensers hanging on for ages
as the yellow-beaked blackbird leaps from the ground
snapping up the tiniest pieces to be found.

House sparrow, tree-creeper unassuming dunnock
rustling in the leaf mould climbing from a hummock
jabbing into small cracks pecking at the dead-heads
and tiny creatures hiding in the soil of the flower beds.

Fluttering and winging all the birds are singing
their chorus to the wind for the weather it is bringing
but then it stops in an instant all that constant bird-talk
ends in the diving shadow of a sparrowhawk.

© BH, 2022

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Rhyming for once but still assonant. That’s the hope for this naturalistic garden piece. Suitable for the younger reader, I suppose. Nah, suitable for all.

There’s a Scots companion, by the way.