lazy Saturday morning
10:45 a.m.
sipping coffee, reading the paper
looks warm outside, sunny with a light breeze
Watching a pair of doves poke about, preen each other, then themselves, all on the back patio just on the other side of the sliding glass door between the kitchen and backyard. I want to think that this is the same pair of doves I've seen over time but how could I know for sure? Doves all look the same to my untrained eyes.
Next it's a pair of mocking birds that catch my eye, gobbling up old drying grapes that I'd put in the hagning pot whose occupant had long since passed on... The mocking birds are much more skittish than the doves, and seem to contantly stop to assess their surroundings.
I realize that the only birds that I've seen today have been in pairs: earlier it was the resident pair of jays, also interested in the grapes, but also at the seed feeders.
Meanwhile, the skittish mocking birds have moved on, I can hear the male's variable song even through the closed door. I can see him now at the top ot the neighbor's chimney. One of the doves flies across the yard to hide in a large hedge bush.
I open the back door to hear the mocking bird's song better and I can hear a second voice, different but almost sounding as if answering or trying to drown his song out.
At last the mocking bird moves on, taking his song with him.
