~ 1 ~
The sun burns orange in the western sky,
It dips and disappears, and way up there
On old Yakuuba’s toothbrush tree you sigh
A sweetly sorrowful pre-migration prayer.
You launch into the void in search of spring,
Whatever doesn’t kill you makes you strong.
A vulture shrugs a valedictory wing:
Au revoir, mon beau phragmite des joncs!
~ 2 ~
Your beak’s magnetic compass does not work
In equatorial lands, but warbler eyes
Are bright, Polaris too, and in the circle
Of Cassiopeia’s spinning throne you’ll find
Your circumpolar south and shining north.
Unflappable at fifteen hundred feet
You flap the lonely trans-saharan course.
Assalaam alaikum, dsaysie.
~ 3 ~
Second right at the dunes of Bouffadi
And straight on till morning you fly,
How weary this passerine passage,
How wind-glazed your warbler eye.
Approaching Tammi you slow down, amazed
By apricot and date palm potpourri,
A heaven-sent pit stop oasis,
Alhamdulillah, dsaysie!
~ 4 ~
For three days at Tammi you refuel your tank
With dainty dates and pomegranate juice,
You know al Jenna is no breeding bank,
You have to bid goodbye, break loose
And set your beak like flint toward the north,
So callibrate your hippocampus compass
To navigate the harsh Mahgrebi course.
Wa alaikum assalam, dsaysie.
~ 5 ~
I ♥ Atlas mountains, I ♥ Alboran Sea,
I ♥ Ibiza, I ♥ Tombouctou,
You’ve been there, flown that, got all the T-
shirts and the yellow jersey too.
Bleary-eyed and weary-winged, you arrive
In the Balearics not one flap too soon
And light on an Aleppo pine – alive!
Bienvenido, carricerín común.
~ 6 ~
One day lying zonked in a carob tree,
Two more in a lethean almond grove,
But now your Devonian destiny
Revives you for the anchor leg above.
With pitiful heaves of feathery flanks
You ride with a heavenly Tour de France,
Match aching wing-beats with the avian ranks,
Allez-allez, petit phragmite des joncs!
~ 7 ~
There’s no Olympic lane on your commute,
No level crossing, toll or traffic isle.
You’ve no congestion charges to compute,
Just geodetic azimuths and miles.
You toil across La Manche and in
The distance spy a Union Jack
And then a holly hedge and wheelie bin.
Hello, sedge warbler, welcome back.