starling raze i didn't notice the severed limb half-hidden in the mess of your plumage until i studied the day's photographs. i sought it out and held it between thumb and forefinger. a thing so thin i could have snapped it like a dry twig. morsels of meat were still attached to a few of your torn-out feathers. ants swarmed to gorge themselves on what hadn't already been eaten. i thought of fast_food chicken that was more skin than sinew. awful as you were to me, i'm relieved i wasn't around to see you being stripped of all that made you move. when my time comes to be peeled like an orange by a predator's toothless mouth, i'll meet you on a bridge made of our bones, and we'll peck at puddles under a thin sliver of moon. 230725 ... epitome of incomprehensibility I like their oily iridescent glow. I delighted in their quick thinking when I saw one grasp the feeder's railing and, because of its size, fail to reach the seeds while leaning straight down, but then realize the next second that it could turn sideways and peck at the grains. But then they deplete the seeds so fast. I've started clapping or waving when I see them, not to compliment their ingenuity, but to scare them away from the feeder. Startling the starlings. 250403 what's it to you? who go blather from