Missel Thrush

 

Wind and rain glide along his tongue.

A quick frost diamonds

the January glint of each black eye.

The speckled pudding

of his chest

looms in the low cotoneaster

feeding our humble gaze.

 

He is swollen with song.

An ecstasy of white sunsets

are target for his notes' artillery.

Undisturbed, through long

nights of Winter,

he out-stares the trudging Hunter

with his belt of stars.

 

Unfurl music's wind-distracted ribbon!

Let the squall unfold its song!

 

In the eye of the branch-torn fury

in the leaf-wrecked gust

at the very centre

as the wheel turns

 

he grips the fluttering score and sings.