Since April is National Poetry Month, I’m taking a break this week from Beatrice Allen Page’s Landscape With Figures to post one of her poems. Because so many people groan when knowing they’ve got to read poetry, I’ve chosen a very simple poem. Utterly accessible, this piece I adore because it puts in my mind’s eye the memory of her feeding chickadees out of her hand at her window like Cinderfrigginrella.
Four Ways To Eat a Sunflower Seed
Cardinal
Come early in the morning to avoid the crowd.
Even though you have the place to yourself,
approach the board with mannerly restraint,
toying with a seed or two
and cheeping your pleasure politely
before actually starting to eat.
Then chumble each seed daintily,
letting the husk split and fall
From your bill unobtrusively.
Just a few seeds will suffice
for your delicate appetite.
Blue Jay
Swoop down on the feeder with an indignant shriek:
The food is terrible but, after all, you have to live.
Grab a seed with gluttonous haste
and hammer it open on the spot
as if it were something you had to kill
before it stung you.
Or, if you’re afraid of interference,
just swallow the seeds whole
without bothering to hull them.
And if another habitue tries to join you,
attack promptly, screaming: “Mine!”
Chickadee
Foregather with a little band of boon companions
in the trees close to the window.
As soon as it opens, dart
onto the outstretched hand that holds the seeds.
Pick one out with the deft assurance
of a connoisseur and fly with it to a nearby branch
where you can hold it between your feet
while you crack it open.
After you have finished the tasty tidbit,
wipe your bill neatly, once on each side, against a twig,
and fly back to the waiting hand for another seed.
Squirrel
Come crashing down in a free fall
from a branch high above.
Then make yourself thoroughly at home
sitting on your haunches,
holding the seeds between your paws to eat,
and eyeing the woman on the other side of the window
with mild interest.
But if she dares to make any kind of threatening gesture,
stare her down for her presumption
and continue eating till you have gorged yourself
and stripped the feeder bare.