Crow Poem by Les Derbyshire

Why, I wonder, did this day start out
A morning of crows and jackdaws?
And I, standing at the window,
Stretching away the hold of the night
While the green and the gold
Wash over the day,
Trickle into each grey hollow,
Waking the village and the valley.

And there they are
On the branches and the wires
And the fence at the bottom of the garden:
Blots.
Dark, ragged blots
Shaken out on the page of the day.

A squabble of sparrows passes
And the dark shapes
In their haphazard morning
Tumble down into the garden.

Will you dance then for me
Your dark mummers' dance?
You curious, hooded fellow,
You tattered bundle of rags,
Your hoarse cry rasping.
Prance and hop,
Strut your comic arrogance,
Your dark eye fixed on me.

Unseen by me, unheard,
A signal from the lookout
On the tallest tree
And all at once the sky is live
With black feather-duster wings,
The air filled with harsh, excited voices.
In a second the garden belongs again to me
And the blackbird.

©Les Derbyshire May 2010