I watch, and am become like a sparrow
That is alone upon the house-top.
– Psalm 102:7
It may have happened a million times. Or it may have happened just this once. Not that it matters. Not to me. Not really. But to the birds, almost certainly. Preeminently the lone shadow which still sings… – Shakespeare’s “substance of a grief” made manifest.
¶
Uh – you shouldn’t mock orange if I were you…
– Annoying Orange
The head-high Philadelphus at the front of our garden is frequently and regularly saturated with convulsions of small passerines: any sudden disturbance therefore causing the bush to emit an explosive cloud of stochastic house sparrows – this randomness, to all appearances, a defence mechanism… – although unfailingly just one heartbeat too late. (A word that will soon – but one expiring breath later… – be sadly applied in its currently all-too-habitual, all-too-self-conscious way to the one bird holding, hanging – held, hung – back to leave both greenery, food, and life, forever behind.)
It feels my fault. It feels as if my attempts at keeping our parochial flutter fully fed – and therefore safer throughout the cold months – have, ironically, contributed to yet another death: lured as they are here by the rich columns of necessary food; of current seed, occasional peanut, and/or wintering fatball. It feels as if my selfish need for avian entertainment – but not of this kind, obviously: however dropjaw… – has left this sole, sad, widowed female betimes to return, always in first place, lonely and lost (as with all our other COVID-19 orphans) – later, to remain, in last place, as something of a synecdoche, perhaps… – to call, to bawl hopelessly, long and longing for her lifelong partner… – now foodstuff itself – “necessary food”, natch… – almost certainly already torn open, torn apart; feathers drifting lethargically to the ground like unexpected snowflakes; its one-talon-up-the-foodchain-higher ravager eagerly sated (I pray) by her fast, fresh meal of blood, flesh, and bone; her victim’s essential, hard-won, long-won memories now forever evaporated – despite being made all the stronger by the… the necessary food I plied so eagerly.
At length, something at least equivalent to love – for the sole, separated, still-soulfully-singing shadow; for one, for all; for each other; for food; for comfort; for certainty; for survival… – for whatever holds sacred to all of them… – reunites the crew in small stuttering gasps of worriment. For the next, too few, days – forced by fading, frit, foreboding – they will, against their instinctual safety in numbers, post guards. Then they will forget. And retreat to what-they-should-know-by-now-is-not-safety inside the now-thinning – now increasingly transparent – mock-orange. (Play; pause; stop; rewind.)
That shadow remains, however. (On her perch of indestructible, muscular, sawn rose-stem. On my heart.) Singing. Serenading her invisible soulmate. Several weeks later… – nevertheless… – still persistently sitting sentinel; with only her memories – perhaps – to comfort her. (If that’s what they do.) Shuddering. Alone again. Naturally.
¶
Early each day to the steps of Saint Paul’s
The little old bird woman comes;
In her own special way to the people she calls:
Come, buy my bags full of crumbs.
Come feed the little birds,
Show them you care;
And you’ll be glad if you do.
Their young ones are hungry,
Their nests are so bare,
All it takes is tuppence from you.
“Feed the birds, tuppence a bag,
Tuppence, tuppence, tuppence a bag;
Feed the birds,” that’s what she cries
While overhead, her birds fill the skies.
All around the cathedral, the saints and apostles
Look down as she sells her wares.
Although you can’t see it, you know they are smiling
Each time someone shows that he cares…
– Richard M. Sherman and Robert B. Sherman: Feed the Birds
I, though, had become familiar with such solitary spasming a few weeks before (its obvious parallels those regrettable shudders of shrub their motile presence intermittently signals; its parallels with my own existence, however, oblivious until typing…). On the bottom of the feeder is a plate of sorts for catching seeds and husks shaken out but not yet taken. It sort of works: the regal sunflower (and countless ‘weeds’) beneath, though, testament to its inherent inefficiencies. Yet, in its defence, it does save a few… – often vacuumed up by those birds not strong, senior, quick, or high-up-the-hierarchy enough to get the rich pickings first-hand.
At their most obedient and collegiate, six spadgers can easily feast, stood on that plate: two with their heads neatly embedded in the main body of the feeder selecting the most choice rewards – their chaff occasionally flying out well beyond the fielding abilities of the other four slotted in quietly, gracefully and gratefully between them (to later morph into a sunflower, perhaps… – although I have witnessed wrens and dunnocks savouring this manniferous littering – as well as slightly surprising pairs of well-camouflaged house sparrows… – all in a considerate, but never-ending, effort to tidy up…). [We have now stocked up with “no grow, no waste, husk-free” bird food… – hopefully giving them a bit of a helping hand!]
But – second to stomach-stuffing – spuggies (seem to) love to squabble (to, er, quarrel) about it: their chattering often growing, crescendo-like – synchronously, symbolically – with the opening wideness of their beaks. When their wings start to flap in irritated sync – pulling their bodies higher (and wider): leaving them tiptoeing unsteadily in a space much too small for them or their group; the equivalent of throwing a glove before the supposed offender’s claws… – it is personal!
Mostly, their épées are tipped. Occasionally, though, one will overbalance; or, worse, overplay its mummery – especially if the supposed offender hasn’t retreated; or, worse, has joined in…. And then contact will be made… – in which case – given airspace – the remaining bingers will spontaneously retreat to a local branch; the feeder pole; the fence-top; or even the ground (usually after having rotated one-hundred-and eighty degrees: their pincer-grip of the edge of the plate remaining tight until their plight is realized – at which time, they will acrobatically – or hilariously: depending on one’s viewpoint… – flip, and then float or flop, to their destiny, unharmed).
For the most part, any contact will be feather-light (what Scots call ‘sprigs’ are, on the whole, pretty unflappable); beaks will retreat; cheeks will heat; and peace will be (temporarily) restored. The above pas de six will rapidly recommence in simulated ignorance; then rewind and replay with a varying cast, with varying numbers… until everyone is sated; or, more likely, it is time to leave… – often en masse, and at uncannily high speed: with non-satisfied stragglers eventually cottoning on; occasionally un à un… – their meeting place evidently programmed in.
Very rarely – despite their supernatural reflexes… – beak will hit beak. And beaks are as smooth and glossy as your fingernails. And then there’s – regrettably – slippage between and across them. (Twixt cup and lip, perhaps.)
¶
What happens is that Fate, which enjoys spicing things up with a dash of the unforeseen, determines that everything must have an end, and forces one of the combatants, sooner or later, to make a mistake. It is therefore merely a matter of keeping Fate at bay long enough for the other man to make a mistake first. Anything else is pure illusion.
– Arturo Pérez-Reverte: The Fencing Master
Blood dribbled thickly and fitfully from its left eye. An old male – as measured by the length of its Whitby-black beard – wisdom as deep as his flocked admiration… – solitary; stumbling into shock on the feeder. Lear’s shadow. Or Gloucester’s?
By the time I slowly reached him, his company – rendered invisible by my presence – was nowhere to be seen (which is not the same as them being far off, of course); and he clung tightly to the stem of the climbing rose (astonishingly now supported only by itself… – as well as our love, of course…) that continues to blossom (blushing a rich sunrise pink) between the feeder and mock-orange: holding on to the branch as if for dear life itself; holding on, dark, etched back towards me, as if ashamed of his wound (as if ashamed of his misperceived inability to protect himself). And shuddering so precipitately that whatever life-force remained would soon be dispersed – electron by electron… – by the south-westerly breeze.
Standing mere inches, mere fingers, away – my brain over-rehearsing a tentative curling of my proprioceptively-challenged right hand… – I therefore assumed certain, sudden death; that no small bird could survive in this state; that – hubristically – any chance of survival depended solely on my actions.
I did nothing.
The only birds I had handled had been fully domesticated: pets; or in zoos. The only birds I had ever handled were larger than this; less delicate: and had been placed there by keepers; or cunningly(!) tempted by food. The only birds I had handled had welcomed the touch of my flesh. (And before my flesh had become so wavering.)
Even after reading what seemed like half the Web, my confidence was still shot. If this bird had any chance of seeing tomorrow, my clumsiness could wipe that out; or worse, leave it with further injuries – in increased pain. (As I know too well, that is an embuggerance anything or anyone could well do without.) Yes, it was of a goodly age. Feasibly three years (or even more) old. A good innings. But why should this be the end?
I did nothing.
I did nothing but pray any remaining or kindled warmth would soothe those shivers; that, maybe – fingers crossed behind my back – just my well-wishing – or, more likely, whatever passes for ‘guts’ in sparrows – would spark its longevity. By the time I had returned inside, somehow it was gone. Flown to a better place? Hopefully, the comfort of its colony.
I did nothing… because I knew nothing.
¶
Here, father, take the shadow of this tree
For your good host; pray that the right may thrive.
– Shakespeare: King Lear (V.i.1-2)
A couple of miserable and somewhat guilt-ridden days passed without a sighting. Weak as it was, one of the garden’s foxes had surely scooped it up by now. [A few mornings previously, a young rat, with two sets of bite marks puncturing the back of its neck, now in rigor mortis, had been left on the small, narrow path left there solely for the servicing of the bird feeders: as if caught for exercise, or for fun, once its killer was sated. As I wrote at the time: “Seen from above… – especially taking notice of the bites… – it’s obvious this poor young rat is dead. (As it also is, once held: and found to be solid as a rock.) [Yet] imagined to be vertical… – it could easily be going for a (rather cartoonish) walk. All that is missing is the bag held in its right front paw, Beatrix-Potter style. Put a hat on it, and we might say ‘Mrs Runcible Rat isn’t looking very well today!’ Or, sans said item, we might ask (in rhyme, natch) why a rat is out and about without a hat….”]
And then I gazed out of the window: and suddenly it did matter! To me. And hopefully – surely – also to its extended family. One of those magical, one-in-a-million moments when coincidence reigns supreme…. There it was! A little unsteady on its feet, definitely; to one side of its peers, undoubtedly, stood as it was – exceptionally – at this end of the fence (the perfect one-eyed prospect), above the unremittingly alluring Rosa glauca and its manifold, bulging drops of large, fresh-blood-coloured hips… – and certainly marked forever (as forever sparrows are…). But, there it stood… – a passerine Rooster Cogburn!
Still one of its company’s elders. Still strong; puffing its soft, darkened-grey chest feathers out, looking almost proud of its survival (I anthropomorphized). And still – to me – as heart-stoppingly beautiful as ever.
I therefore kept watching out for it every day: whether stood by the window, or just sat… – Felix frequently on my lap – lazily reading, writing, or headphoning. Of course, I didn’t see it every day; but I did watch; and prayed that it would survive the coming winter; that not one member of the flock should be left grieving.
One afternoon it arrived on what my dad would have called “its lonesome”, invisibly clothed in a cloak of tranquility: patiently pecking at the seeds; only occasionally looking around with its right, remaining eye; but frequently returning to the surmised safety of the mock-orange….
¶
…imitate the action of the tiger;
Stiffen the sinews, conjure up the blood,
Disguise fair nature with hard-favor’d rage;
Then lend the eye a terrible aspect;
Let it pry through the portage of the head
Like the brass cannon; let the brow o’erwhelm it
As fearfully as doth a galled rock
O’erhang and jutty his confounded base,
Swill’d with the wild and wasteful ocean.
Now set the teeth and stretch the nostril wide,
Hold hard the breath, and bend up every spirit
To his full height.
– Shakespeare: Henry V (III.i.6-17)
It may have happened a million times. Or it may have happened just this once. It’s the hell-dark stripes that remain printed vividly on the inside of my eyelids: sculpted deeply as they are into the creature’s very form. They may well have been imprinted on its victim, too: darkness – surely? – the last thing it sees. (Hope against hope, I do pray so: rather that than its ever-searching, deep, globular, rich egg-yolk-coloured eyes… – so astounding and shocking a shade that it leaches onto the orbit’s rim.)
At first, my brain screamed kestrel: all that brown…. But the bulk of the bird was wrong; as was the behaviour. Think sparrow. Think sparrowhawk. (As I should have done before.)
This one was assuredly a female: tight and muscular; stropped sharp as the purpose that guided her: arriving here all at once as if from nowhere; another universe; materializing from nothing into this one, in the smallest moment possible… – with just enough time and space to manoeuvre into…
…a distinctive pattern of rapid flap-flap wingbeats followed by a short glide…. Sparrowhawks are exceptionally agile hunters and, with its sights set…, this one went streaking through the narrow gaps between the branches like a guided missile.
– Claire Stares: Country diary…
The few seconds the hawk spent in the maze of the mock-orange ticked sluggishly. Once she had chosen and subdued her quarry, however, she launched speedily from the heart of the deep shuddering shrub with something dark and brown held tight within her beak. I blinked. They were both no more.
¶
Thou’lt come no more,
Never, never, never, never, never.
– Shakespeare: King Lear (V.iii.303-304)
¶
Days pass, and the old one-eyed sparrow has yet to return. Now, I think, I know why the lone shadow sings. And for whom.
Break, heart, I prithee break!
– Shakespeare: King Lear (V.iii.309)
Dedicated to Amy and Ben: my favourite ‘pairomedics’!
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