bird

Shared Space

Image of a bird beside a parked car on a roadside next to a swatch of grass. Used for a poem about the ecological impacts of roads and expanded development.
Photo by K E Garland

You cruise on design modelled after my flight

Aerodynamic, beats walking through traffic

My wing spans effortlessly

I look down at arterials carved through my forest(ry)

Arteries, feathers, blood, beak, and bone

A sacrificial offering

For your carbon fuelled emitting

Omitting thought

For me and my kind

Forcing me to concede

My home

No longer

Mine

Mined

Mind if we stand still?

For some

Time

Space shared

There’s a sign

Ominously announcing

No park(ing)

Concrete ideas in place of green trees

Before risking the wrath of the no park(ing) inspector

You ignite

My heart and your pistons

Pounding

Reciprocating engines

A primal reaction

We take flight

Oh,

What a feeling!

 

Poem inspired by the image posted by my friend and fellow blogger K E Garland. Kathy regularly posts inspiring quotes (kwotes), images, ideas and thought-provoking, consciousness-raising articles. Thanks for the inspiration Kathy, particularly when I was so close to posting two back to back posts from my travel through the tumbleweed series, if I didn’t get new inspiration! Kathy and I have previously collaborated on a post with tips on maintaining goals and new year resolutions.

 

 

The Magpie

Photograph by Richard Baxter
Photograph by Richard Baxter

Extract: Turning Point 2, Step 1, Sequence 3, Scene 3

The magpie had been teasing till now, flying at handle bar height and swooping back and forth in front of her. As they got to the busier part of the park, complete with a kid’s jungle gym, a barbeque and dogs catching frisbees and each other’s tails, the noise and commotion set the magpie to resume its normal tendency and fly high, away from the human and canine disturbances. Mildred kept her eyes glued to it as she peddled faster, putting her bike into gear on autopilot, knowing that there was a hill coming up, the path was that familiar to her, from the days of her pink tricycle with its flying ribbons on her handlebar. The magpie was only distinguishable now because of the red speck that was the little bag it held clasped in its beak. Its warble was no longer discernable from that of its black and white brethren and the general sound of people enjoying the sunshine in the park. With her eyes averted from the path and forgetting the elementary rule that what goes up must come down, the downhill of the path caught her by surprise, her feet madly peddling against no resistance, as her bike freewheeled, crashing into a folding card table on the edge of the path, positioned in the unfortunate spot of the first bit of flat after the descent. The table collapsed and toppled onto her, sandwiching Mildred between it and her bike which lay on it’s side, front wheel still spinning.

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