We, the birds
Kula, HI
2025, Senior, Poetry & Spoken Word
Every day at dusk
the sky slowly melting
black ink along blank paper
hundreds of birds
Leap towards the heavens
I do not know
what colors
the shifting sun conceals
Like running water they stream
blurred beads of night
their shadowed forms circle
into the neighbor’s tree
Edges blur
with a thousand wingbeats
how can so many reside in one?
I cannot say
I only know that their
desperate screeches
pull air from my lungs
into the cyclone
I imagine they are
overcrowded and seething
fighting for a foothold
I see a strange similarity
I like to think, then
that birds take more
than could ever be needed
from the gnarled tree
Picture the endemic insect
pillaged and farmed
to feed the many appetites
the birds snap stick and leaf
To build their homes
the beautiful shielding canopy
broken and letting in
sweltering sun
How could they stop?
maybe, I dream
they scream for change
but no one bird
Can mark change in wants
to find, to destroy, to hoard
essentials for all life
taken like a breath
But, I feel a Maybe
as I sprawl in mossy branches
my ancient tree,
Maybe there’s a bird
Hidden in a quiet nook
opening its wings
releasing a noise so deafening
attention must be paid
Not just one–
a hundred, a million
inky specks
against the cosmos
Ready
to steward
to shepherd
to rise, rise, rise–
Why don’t they leave?
now here, my musings must end
for birds can choose
many a tree
We, however,
cannot.
Reflection
Every night, I see hundreds of birds swarm to a small tree near my neighbor’s house. The number of birds that arrive at one time and drop into the tree never ceases to amaze me. I can hear their chirping from my house, and whenever I walk close to the tree near sundown it is nearly deafening. Sometimes I go and look at the tree in the daytime, and it is obvious that it has quite a bit of damage from the overwhelming amount of birds. This inspired the connection I made, that the birds are to the tree as humans are to the planet. Of course, I had no way of knowing the exact state of the tree and the birds inside, but I mused that they were similar to the degrading effects of overpopulation on the Earth. This contest theme helped me relate what is happening around me to my own life. It helped me learn how to learn from nature, which has valuable lessons to share if one is willing to listen. I hope readers take my poem as inspiration to fight against the overconsumption of nature’s resources.