13.03.2020

I was chatting with this old bird today and he told me a story from once upon a time in my backyard. In the beginning when his kind had arrived to this lush paradise, he gestured wildly with his wing, life was simple. They ate. They squawked. They flew. They slept.

But for some happy flappers it was not enough. He ruffled his feathers and bobbed towards me. They wanted to make things easier instead. A privileged flock fat with seed capital crammed these trees too full. They gave every bird a tiny screen and glued it to them. A pecking order began to emerge, as the sky's face darkened each night in warning.

Bird life had changed, he said trashing the geranium as his claws curled, they had become so clever and comfortable that they had forgotten how to fly. Or why. Heavy with hubris and squawking like their cries were all that mattered, they didn't hear themselves choking.

He paused to hurl seed all over the balcony and fixed me with a narrowed bird's eye view. Oh I'd heard about it already from a couple of bar-tailed godwits that had been blown off course when the earth tipped. All about this awful little germ that injected you with fear and ate your wings from the inside out. He ruffled and flared his in exclamation, I knew it was coming.

Soon it was all over our bird TVs. They wheeled on birdxperts to tell us to stay calm and still go to the footy, with not a flyer among them. The flock was freaking and flapping. He winked at me, it was unprecedented. But I heard the crows cawing from a different tree. I watched the spiders still weaving and the foxes with their noses to the wind. The tides never stopped once and the trees told the truth. So I went back to my branch. I squawked. I flew. I slept.

He spat the corn kernels over the edge, besides I like my wings too much. I'm a corella and we have to whirl and dangle and play, his comb rising like a smile, I've got no plans to start acting like a great tit. He finished the seed and tossed the rest all about so I wouldn't forget. And then he took off towards a tangerine sky, his wings catching the last tip of the light.

Words and image c. Kerrie Basha 2020