Robin Redux
Only when one goes all afluttery
atop another, ghosting up sandy dust,
can we tell he from she. It seems wrong,
even though Shakespeare thought It
good enough for Hamlet’s Dad
once dead. Robin (let’s call her her)
sounds out early morning adhans
from tippy-top peaks of pines
then warbles for an hour in cedar murk
before ground grubbing all day.
She races in mincing little struts
but a few feet hither and then yon
to stab some better dirt. A creature
of proper posture, straight as a butler
in tails. “Throw out that chest!”
you remember from days in uniform.
Always edgy, twitching her head
right then left as if we’d eat her,
as once we did, I do suspect.
Though not we as in you and me
but the creatures we are, or once were
when hunger made us curious,
though all I’ve said herein is suspect
and I, who so insolently dared
to presume the gender of a robin,
should not speak for you at all.
atop another, ghosting up sandy dust,
can we tell he from she. It seems wrong,
even though Shakespeare thought It
good enough for Hamlet’s Dad
once dead. Robin (let’s call her her)
sounds out early morning adhans
from tippy-top peaks of pines
then warbles for an hour in cedar murk
before ground grubbing all day.
She races in mincing little struts
but a few feet hither and then yon
to stab some better dirt. A creature
of proper posture, straight as a butler
in tails. “Throw out that chest!”
you remember from days in uniform.
Always edgy, twitching her head
right then left as if we’d eat her,
as once we did, I do suspect.
Though not we as in you and me
but the creatures we are, or once were
when hunger made us curious,
though all I’ve said herein is suspect
and I, who so insolently dared
to presume the gender of a robin,
should not speak for you at all.
