Strand of Pine

[Atehequa]

Far too many sad mourning doves
Always do they coo the same old line
The ground is always covered with needles
In this dark and gloomy strand of pine

No grass or flowers will grow here
Unfertile earth beneath the needle litter
No breeze carrying the fragrance of nectar
I can smell only pine sap, sticky and bitter

Evergreen boughs forever shading views
Aside from mourning doves, few other signs
Any existing patch of warm bright sunlight
Crowded with sad doves and seedling pines

Beholden to no pine beetle cliques
Or any sappy, thin bark pine forest lord
There are always other places to roam
And many free flowing rivers to ford

The pine lord’s cones, needles and beetles
Hungry borer grubs eat of the dying tree
So ponder deeply what is heard or read
And believe not everything you see

Weary of pine borers and mourning doves
Preferring something else on which to dine
A kestrel issued a shrill cry then flew away
And the hawk followed her out this strand of pine

[dadio]

Very good theme and wording.

[justwalt]

there were a thousand crows in the pines behind my
childhood home... they woke with the sun each day and
began to drown out the whole neighborhood with squawking...

then off to the river they went to feast until dusk, then returned.
after sundown they all shut up and dreamed about silly ground-dwellers.

[Atehequa]

there were a thousand crows in the pines behind my
childhood home... they woke with the sun each day and
began to drown out the whole neighborhood with squawking...

then off to the river they went to feast until dusk, then returned.
after sundown they all shut up and dreamed about silly ground-dwellers.

We had a few dozen or so that frequent the grounds where I work. They harried the hell out of the red tail and red shouldered hawks, but through late summer and into early autumn a pair of cooper's hawks took out half those crows. You should hear the weird cackling sound a crow makes while being hunted on the wing.

This will happen again probably next August.

[Atehequa]

Very good theme and wording.

Thanks dadio