�Behold the fowls of the air: for they sow not, neither do they reap, nor gather into barns; yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not much better than they?� Mathew 6:26 KJV
A March windstorm has displaced a good-sized bird�s nest from its lofty, once secure place in the sprawling elm on my front yard. A very strong gust must have toppled it.
Scooping this sturdy abode into my hands and examining it, I concluded that probably a family of robins or cardinals had been the occupants.
Delicately constructed with mostly organic ingredients, this circular one-room home was made with massive blades of dried buffalo grass, a conglomeration of twigs, sticks strands of alfalfa, dried out corn husks, cottonwood leaves and mud.
There�s bird spit sown in everywhere, applied as an adhesive, although, now invisible.
Along with all the natural elements is a mix-match of man-made stuff � litter woven in. Studying the materials of the nest builder, to whom I am by now feeling akin, I marvel at how resourceful and forgiving nature sometimes can be.
There are three dirty swatches of yellow and blue fiberglass insulation � most likely from a construction site�
�a shred of plastic from someone�s grocery sack,
�a tangled mass of human hair, maybe from a women�s hair brush,
�some purple and pink dryer lint,
�and part of a plastic ring from somebody�s six-pack.
There�s a tiredness about the nest � a sublime fatigue that I can�t quite get past. I try to imagine the subtext buried deep within � the goings on from last season�
� enduring endless early March days after a long flight north from southern latitudes�
�building a place to stay in temperatures just above freezing,
�singing breeding songs with the winter flock,
�filling the air with joyous sounds that, as a lubricant, releases winter�s frigid hold and invite spring�s return.
My narrow focus leads me to the porch where I lovingly place the fallen nest, as a war-torn soldier, on an empty plant stand. I don�t think the wind will blow it away here, but I provisionally place a heavy rock in its empty shell � just in case. I�m saving the discarded nest for a time, as I always seem to do.
There�s something deep down inside of me that ponders this pitiful artifact: the forces that built it, the way it withstood nature, the mournful litter strung through it, the life it once bore and at last its fatal fall.
I like to think this nest was a good home for a bird family � a place where one cohesive unit ate together, slept together, rose together, sang together, celebrated together, grew together cried together, loved together, weathered storms together � stayed together. I want to believe it was place of honor and respect.
We can only hope for as much.
A resident of Southeast South Dakota, Paula Bosco Damon is a national award-winning columnist. Her writing has won first-place in competitions of the National Federation of Press Women, South Dakota Press Women and Iowa Press Women. In the 2009 and 2010 South Dakota Press Women Communications Contest, Paula�s columns took five first-place awards. To contact Paula, email pauladamon@iw.net, follow her blog at http://my-story-your-story.blogspot.com/ and find her on Facebook.
2011 � Copyright Paula Damon.
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