It happens this way …
With apologies to birders, I am not one. Of course I enjoy watching them zip around the yard but I’m not happy when they rev up their music at 4:15 a.m. outside my bedroom window or when three crows chase a hawk across the skies above our neighborhood. I imagine the former are excited that the sun will rise in less than an hour and hope the crows will not catch up with the hawk.
Anyway, three winters ago, my little heart ached at the thought the local birds might go hungry in forecasted snow. So out to the store I went and bought a feeder and some high quality birdseed. Every morning I’d look out the window expecting to see an orgy, filled with arias of gratitude in my honor. Nope! This is what happened:
To the songbirds who spurned my feeder
I’m confused. I thought when thistle filled
the Copper Triple Tube, we had a deal.
You’d breakfast in tranquility, spread notes
around our cul-de-sac, return
for evening snacks, and sing, of course,
your best for me. But I thought wrong.
You’ve scavenged through my annuals,
electing seeds – prosaic and alive –
in lieu of mixtures trendy and refined;
refused to jump from ground to rim
before the winter storms set in
to shut my garden down.
I’ve cut my loss and hurt, and stashed
the copper with my thistle sacks.
See the note tacked on the vacant pole:
We’re closed. Gone south. Enjoy the seedless snow.
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My little cold-hearted heart finally melted this spring and I bought some songbird seed to augment my leftover thistle. After moving the feeder around the yard four times with hopes of enticing the critters, I finally found a spot – I thought – that was safe and shaded. Six weeks have gone by with a few visitors who knock the seed to the ground and eat from there. This morning I moved the feeder off its stand and watched a little bird stare at it and then at me. No breakfast yet for this little one, no arias for me!
To all you bird lovers and feeders out there, any suggestions?
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Gladiola Update
These pink-trimmed whites just bloomed in another part of the garden and have for three seasons. The question: Will they turn orange next year? Here’s hoping not!
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