reflections from a female chickadee
Autumn. Hippocampus swells. I collect
1,000 seeds a day, remember
each storage niche.
That’s half my winter diet. Spiders,
insects provide balance. Less predictable
more satisfying.
If a human ate like a bird,
she would chow down
25 pizzas each day.
Winter. Stash seeds in clusters
of spruce needles, bark crevices. Brain cranks
with urgency, oncoming cold.
I amass 8,000 seeds this season.
Spring. Settle into abandoned woodpecker
cubby, softened with moss, dead marmot fur.
Same neighborhood; we don’t migrate.
I doze all day, grow heavy. Legs stiff,
wings creaky. Babies
rustle in their eggs until too large,
start to break through. My mate brings food, news.
Summer. Fledglings famished.
I capture 1,000 small caterpillars daily.
Solid protein for sturdy bones, keen vision.
Sunlight arrives early, stays late. Titmice,
warblers, nuthatches call
from nearby willows. Their babies,
too, squeak with hunger.
Ducks dive through pond’s surface,
trout rise, wide mouths eager for flies,
mosquitos. Burgeoning livens my days.
Limbic brain shrinks.
Food is plentiful.
I feel light.