Hope is the thing with feathers

When John came home from work today he said he had just seen something amazing: a pileated woodpecker diving before him, just yards before he turned into the driveway.

John James Audobon, Plate #111 Birds of America

Woody Woodpecker was pileated, quite special, and we're glad to welcome his species to the neighborhood.

I love birds, but hardly know anything about them, even though I regularly feed them, hear them, see them, and find them dead. Next week this time I will be in the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge with a group of 16 birders, and so I should soon know more.

Coincidentally I have two photos in a local art and poetry exhibit, only there because the curator is a friend and thought to invite me. The exhibit is inspired by Emily Dickinson's poem #314. She did not title her poems.

Dickinson's first line "Hope is the thing with feathers" is the focus of the art and poetry of this show.

The poem, and a few more photos:

Hope is the thing with feathers

That perches in the soul,

And sings the tune without the words,

And never stops at all,

And sweetest in the gale is heard;

And sore must be the storm

That could abash the little bird

That kept so many warm.

I've heard it in the chillest land

And on the strangest sea;

Yet, never, in extremity,

It asked a crumb of me.