Running for Your Life: What’s Nest?

One day on a recent run I came upon a small, perfectly formed bird’s nest. Like the leaves I catch when the situation presents, I carried my nest treasure carefully in my hand during the balance of my run. I later sprayed it with a light coat of varnish in order to keep its intricate shape and beauty. I collect barkskins, nests, etc., for what is becoming a visual arts project I call “Dawn Times.”

That has altered my running pathways some. On a second strangely mild day (Dec. 5) I was drawn to the sound of a blue jay, who was making an incredible racket on a Prospect Park hillside. I followed my “noise,” and came to the base of a thirty-foot tree, freshly bare of leaves. Near the top in a crux of thin branches was what must have been the cause of the commotion, and the impetus for this poem:

December, Be Damned

The sound of the blue jay
spring-rasp
in December
from above and
below the way
she defies
pinpointing
throws me,
looking up
to yet another small but perfectly
formed nest in
a barren tree
jog jog jog
toward it and
she SHOUTS
so yeah
stay the fuck away
December, be damned.

Next: Running for Your Life: Renaissance Reverbs


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