April 26, 2012

Clouds have returned, gray and darker gray, piling up on the floor of the sky like dirty laundry.  The sun will probably bleach them out white later, but for now they are drab and dull.  Two crows are having an argument about something really important right outside the window.  I can see their dark silhouettes against the lighter sky.  Their beaks opening and closing, and their wings ruffling, they are so agitated you can almost feel heat pouring off them, as they take turns voicing their vehement opinions.  I hear no other birds, perhaps they are all listening to the crows' argument.  The air is still, nothing is even twitching, nothing but furious crows.  There is no sunlight in the yard yet, just the deep shadow making everything look distant and dark.

Crows

Again in the morning
arguing
black against gray dawn
your voices loud
your anger trembling
through your slick feathers

starting the day
with opinions
which cannot be given up
which must be shouted
to a world not ready to listen
sleeping and just waking

your beak opens
black tongue raised
and from your throat
that fury opens
you tell what you know
when there is no knowing

and the other crow
objects   knowing
what it knows is
the only knowing
and nothing will come
of what you know

and it goes on
louder and more harsh
wings beginning to lift
with each phrase until
bursting with what you know
you both fly up into morning

and silence is the conclusion

S. Crowson

And so there is quiet now, the crows have gone, and far off in other yards I begin to hear other birds, birds with songs, just beginning to greet the day.  I wonder what crows know that they are so willing to argue over, it has all the cadence and fury of desperation, and I wonder what can be so important tp them or are they, like some old married couples, just arguing to be arguing, to have a little excitement in their morning.  They are certainly loud about it, either way.

The cane is making little white spikes, so bright against the dark ground, so persistent, so wild.  In the cave of stalks and leaves, one of the cats is prowling, noisily, certain to catch no rabbit making all that rattling.  Sunlight is just beginning to creep into the yard and light up the tops of the cane; the clouds are bleaching to white.  Silence is fading to more song now in the calm after crows.