14 April 2010
Hummingbird and Chickadee
Lately I feel like I’m living near an aviary. Birdsong is everywhere. There’s even a new call I don’t recognize. For the most part I don’t see any of the chorus birds. I see murders and kits of the the usual; crow, pigeon, crow, pigeon, the odd robin. Except. The other day when I was running I ran by a ruby throated hummingbird! And early this week a chickadee waged war with its reflection in our kitchen window. Rosc read that a black silhouette cutout of a bird of prey would keep it from flying into the window. I had no time to cut out a kestrel before leaving the house, so I taped up an interim scarecrow: parts of Comcast and AT&T bills, the creepiest papers I had on hand. It did the trick.
The last two lines in your post made me laugh so hard!! I love it!
I was the shadow of the waxwing slain
By feigned remoteness in the windowpane.
Though it sounds as if it were the nearness, not the remoteness, your chickadee objected to, poor creature. I am glad it had the good sense to be frightened of chicks with bigger bills. ;)