Many of my poems are not autobiographical, but this one is. I can still remember that moment: the early-morning air, the flash of blue. The pang I felt.
In the intervening years I’ve gotten to know blue jays much better as a species and as individuals. I’ve spent endless hours reading about them, watching them, talking to them, and listening. I’ve studied an audio glossary of jay calls and songs in the vain hopes of learning to understand at least a little of their language. Still, the birds of this poem have their own private, gleaming little niche in my memory, vivid and tender as a bruise.
Right Then
Ransacking the grass
at the edge of the parking lot,
the loveliest jay
I’ve ever seen.
His features,
so fine. His blues,
so bright.
He cocks his crest
at my idling car
:
I sigh behind the wheel.
He screams.
Another bird flutters down.
She is smaller than her mate,
her neck feathers
mute and iridescent
as shade-grown violets.
Two hops and he is gone
into the brambles. She follows
:
Right then.
That’s when I miss you.
*
Image via Unsplash. A version of this poem originally appeared in Passionfruit.
Magnificent and heart rending
Lovely poem about a lovely bird.
Thanks for this poem, Kate, and for the story of your blue jays.
It seems I’m in a storytelling mood. Forgive me. When I taught freshman composition, after reading some Annie Dillard essay, I ushered the students out doors and over to a small decorative pond not far from where our class met. While I stood there answering some question, two ducks mated in front of us! So fast. And yet a few students followed my eyes, my mouth probably still open mid-sentence, and we all looked–too stunned to realize exactly what we’d witnessed. Such strange gifts we receive when we dare to luck up.