Merula

Yesterday the garden was a world of warmth and ease. The sweet scent of lilac and cherry blossom filled the air, in which hoverflies, skilful as circus performers, hung over a green lawn. Lush leaves sparkled with ruby red ladybirds, and the chocolate rich tones of a wood pigeon flowed overhead. Now and then the calm was broken by the sharp cry of a blackbird, but no one took notice of his too frequent panic: spring had begun and all was well. Today is different. The sky is deeper; the awful truth of its indigo limits painfully apparent. Snowbright clouds roll through like icebergs freed from the mother glacier. Powerless, despite their great bulk, a determined wind guides them out towards the horizon, their final fate unknown. Nearer the earth the brisk wind moves supple branches back and forth as if the garden was at the bottom of the sea, its trees transformed into spires of seaweed floating in an uneasy current. The fragile insects are sheltering in dark crevasses. It is as if the garden has emptied. The one survivor is Merula, the blackbird. He cant leave, he cant stop; he must feed his family. His chicks, protected by sharp holly leaves, wait patiently while he and his tired looking partner anxiously probe the ground for those dormant insects. In the air above a solid form moves straight to the holly and muscles its way into its depths. Merula flies up. Shouts. The tree moves as if alive, jerking and shuddering. He shouts and shouts. A long pied feather erupts from the leaves, followed by a massive head. The blackbird dives down wings flapping. Indifferent the magpie shoulders back into the tree determined to find the chicks. All Merula can do is cry his anguish. Inside, the magpie works towards the nest, but the holly is ancient, its branches grow close. He is too big to easily move through. He surfaces again to think the problem through. Again the blackbird flies at him but he knows he is invulnerable, and doesnt waste energy reacting. Deciding on another approach he forces himself back into the dark holly disappearing from view. The tree shakes. Merula continues his desperate shrieks. Colossal clouds lumber overhead. A large one slides in front of the sun plunging the garden into shadow and cold. The magpie breaks out and flies up onto a chimney pot. Calmly it rises up and moves away, its black and white colouring sharp against a violently blue sky. It reminds me of an orca.

Did he carry a chick? I couldnt see.

Garden65.blogspot

June 2012

Janet Walsh