Covid is still with us, so simple delights of being in nature and reading a good book are pleasant rewards and a good use of the extra time we have saved by buying over the internet instead of “shopping around”. This episode tells stories about birds, books & buying in this new reality.
MARSH TRAIL MUD
Watching birds
clears my mind
as I revel in their variety,
movements and beauty.
Early April morning sunrise,
The water has come down
leaving mud flats and puddles
big birds have mostly gone
and been replaced.
Smaller shore birds are here
an undulating cloud of Sanderlings
move and land as one.
Tiny plovers legs blur
as they run around.
Black-necked stilts elegant
on their bright orange legs
dip down effortlessly.
Greater and lesser yellow legs
sandpipers eat, float and forage.
Two contrasting couples appear,
beautiful blue-winged teals
float quietly past.
A passionate moor hen
chases his mate
flapping and splashing.
Its time to go now
the insects feeding time
and I am their food.
BOOKS
Outside the library
i carefully pick up
books tumbling
out of the boys arms
I smile
The small boy so excited
holding so many books.
Maybe i was like that too
on my first library visit
which opened up
many new worlds
for me.
I’m happy to see
books are still read
even as iPads
seem so often
to win attention.
The tactile turning of pages,
feeling the weight of the book,
seeing the writers words in print,
knowing many others held this book
makes me happy.
I am inspired to go to my library
and browse the shelves,
instead of the internet,
and pick a book out
that offers itself to me;
hoping I will take it home
and it feels my eyes looking
and my warm hands cradling it
then this book knows
it is loved.
COVID SHOPPING & SHIPPING #1
I am waiting for the box to arrive.
I must order something first.
Then there is great satisfaction,
finding the box outside
before the text tells me its here
this reminds me
my ESP is working faster
than the internet
and the drivers fingers.
COVID SHOPPING & SHIPPING #2
Amazon Prime is almost an addiction,
I want to see how fast it arrives,
until I realize that the orders
are filled by people forced
to rush around, reach and twist;
chased by robotic baskets
in a race to keep their jobs.
I hate that line I remember
from my boss years ago,
“you’re lucky to have a job”.
COVID SHOPPING & SHIPPING #3
The bags of food appeared miraculously
as if we had asked for 10 lbs of flour,
a six pack of heineken
and 3 flavors of melting ice cream.
Before the bag becomes glass bottles
coated with creamy raw gluten
A risk the shopper had not imagined.
the true owner claimed his food.
EARTH DAY
Wednesday was Earth Day 2021.
Looking out of the window
the graceful swallow-tailed kite
effortlessly swooped past.
Tuesday I lay in the dirt
watching wide eyed burrowing owls
watching me.
On Midway Island
the Laysan albatross, Wisdom
still lays an egg
at the age of seventy.
Reminding us that we humans
are guests and guardians
of this living planet.
©MartinStrasmore2021