Evening Window

I wrote the rough ‘bones’ of this poem in 1991, the year after we moved to Oregon.


Original digital surreal art: “Chubby Chickaree” by: rob kistner © 9/28/23

 
Outside my Oregon window
here in the Cascade foothills
late afternoon celebrates

alive with September sun
and the scurry of small things
warmed by Summer’s soft surrender

post-equinox nature
awaits Autumn’s dressing
in splendid voice

the chuff of tree’d red squirrel
the American Red Squirrel

Tamiasciurus Hudsonicus

referred to by many
as the chickaree
or even pine squirrel

these chattery little bandits
prefer the higher-elevation
coniferous forests of Oregon

they blend their chittered bursts
with the songs
chirps
and trills of birds

chickadee
goldfinch
western bluebird
northern flicker
western tanager

and high airborne
osprey
hawk
and eagle

so many others
that fly
flutter
and flit
through the intoxicating
PAC Northwest mountain air

all the while
quick little chickaree

in lightning-fast raiding parties
are stealing
cracking
and eating
the black-oil sunflower seeds
that they effortlessly spill
from my
“strategically placed”
squirrel-proof
bird feeders

yeah / right!

nothing is safe
from these scampering
bushy-tailed brigands

they can climb straight up
an extremely slippery
pencil-thin
6’ tall black metal pole

utterly amazing

I watch it
still don’t believe it

cute as they are
they’re exasperating

these seed raids go on
under the patient eye
of a wise Red-Tailed Hawk

also with a mind on dinner


Original digital surreal art: “Patience”
by: rob kistner © 9/28/23

casually calling
from the very top
of a Sitka spruce
swaying in the crisp gilding sky

he watches

woven into this sonic tapestry
the sweet muffled belling
of a White Tailed deer
wandering in the safety of old-growth
whispering in these foothills

the quiet bark of a neighbor’s dog
echoes through the basin
up along the stream
signaling its curiosity

reminding me fondly
we have dear friends nearby

the soothing rustle of leaves
large and small
stirred by the breezes
waft through this valley

scented by bark
loam
and moss

by foothill wildflowers

the fragrances of living earth

as I swoon
my reverie is smartly punctuated
by the staccato of conifer cones
that fall from time to time

wrested free by pine squirrel
and chipmunk
conversing boisterously
high in the Douglas Fir
busy with their forage

wap! wap! wap!

cones strike the ground
and bounce off our roof

closely followed
by the flurry of their liberators
crunching their way
to the heart-meat of the cone

the delicacy
that elicits
this furious industry

some they hide away
for a later treat

I exhale softly
seated by my evening window
with tea
and fascination

mesmerized by all I behold

my spirit full
I am profoundly aware
of how blessed I am

how very precious
these moments are

and

that they will not last
forever


Original digital surreal art: “Evening Window”
by: rob kistner © 9/28/23

*
rob kistner © 9/28/23
Poetry at: dVerse

 

20 thoughts on “Evening Window”

  1. You live in a wonderful natural setting, Rob. Those squirrels are something else! Very resourceful at getting what they want.

    nothing is safe
    from these scampering
    bushy-tailed brigands

  2. I really enjoyed this Rob, the imagery superb. I could see the squirrels and the other birds and hawk watching from high. The squirrels around here are busy gathering acorns and whatever else they can find. Often raiding my bird-feeder and the chipmunks cheeks are full as they scurry to their hiding places. You have captured a precious moment for sure. The digital image you created “Patience” is beautiful. The hawk is my totem animal, when I see one I watch carefully for a message.

  3. Just beautiful. Thank you so much for this poem of the creatures, foraging, stealing and waiting for dinner. The falling cones the wonderful sounds and images of nature. I loved seeing all this through your words. 🙂

  4. Oh my, I feel like I was a visitor to your beautiful setting. I so enjoyed all the imagery, movement and focus on the auditory of nature. Then there is the underlying realization and appreciation of life’s cycle.
    On another note – have you tried the metal cone that attaches around the pole of the feeder? It worked like a charm for us.

    1. First of all, thank you Mitch, very much for your kind words. Yes, I have tried so many things, including a metal cond that went around the feeding pole just below the feeder. Problem was, there were so many very tall conifer trees there in the foothills of Oregon’s Cascade Mountains that the damn squirrels are so smart they just get up in the tree and Jumped 1520 feet and landed on the feeder that they’re crazy but thank you for your suggestion glad it worked for you

  5. woven into this sonic tapestry
    the sweet muffled belling
    of a White Tailed deer

    That rang out clearly for me, Rob, yet really I could have chosen most of the lines as my favourite ones here…

    A rich litany of feast-courses for the senses… what a pugnaciously ALIVE poem (like the pine ssquirrels) and I am so glad to call by and sit with you in your window.

    Thank you!

    1. Hi Jim. I started the basic bones of this pouem in 1991, when we first moved from Ohio to Oregon. We lived in Oregon for 26 years, and for me they were 26 years in paradise. Circumstances now finally find my wife snd I living north, in Seattle Washington, owing to the love of my son and daughter-in-law — but I will forever hold Oregon in my heart, as my “home”. The place is magnificent.

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