Each year with peace the mother geese
Find those penthouse nests after the snows
They see platforms for ospreys:
prime waterfront real estate. For a time,
they settle themselves, get comfortable,
squat home with mirth; they are there first.
But.
Each year in May there comes a day
when these geese have lost their lease.
Ospreys come back. I’ve never seen an attack
and yet one day raptor eyes appraise the skies,
and forsooth! There’s no longer a single penthouse dwelling goose!
poem-ornithological optimism April 8, 2025
poem-optimism March 1, 2016
Each year a goose takes roost in
the osprey nest platform above the mill.
I suppose penthouse accommodations entice.
The view is lovely there,
and surely she feels superior to her kin
nesting waterfront (though their
recreational opportunities are greater).
Each year, after a month of goose occupancy,
the ospreys return.
I do not know the depth of the tragedy.
Do the evicted geese simply suffer homelessness,
or do they endure the grief of infanticide, as well?
Sometimes our lofty aspirations
are our undoing.
Our hubris is our hamartia,
but each year, in early spring, there’s a goose
in the osprey nest.
.
.
.
.
Remember your Shakespeare lessons? Hamartia is the ‘fatal flaw’ of your personality that leads to your downfall (most commonly in literary tragedies). Hubris is an excess of pride.
poem- eviction May 28, 2014
The ospreys
have reclaimed their
towering nesting boxes
evicting squatting
Canada Geese.
Their raptor eyes
study the horizon
and I wonder
if they raptured
over goose eggs.
.
.
A corollary to an earlier post:
One commenter was concerned about goslings hurting themselves falling out of the nesting platforms. That was the least of their worries, apparently.
poem- real estate April 8, 2014
The Canada Geese
have taken up penthouse accommodations
in the osprey platforms.
Two lady geese on two platforms
watch the cars pass on the highway
enjoying the view,
liking this nest.
They’re distant neighbours
proud to be moving on up.
I wonder how that will go
when the ospreys return?
.
.
(Ospreys are raptor type birds that like to live beside lakes and rivers where they are avid fishers, are partial to building their huge nests on the T-bars of power poles. The hydro company and/or local naturalists, build platforms beside tempting poles to relocate them to safer premises. The ospreys will return to these nesting sites year after year. Apparently, the geese like them, as well! This video is from the other side of the country, back in 2011)
Shawn L. Bird 