Iona Winter

A murmuration of starlings forage over seed cakes I’ve hung from the tree.

Late winter hunger, urgent and competitive. Sleet has also flown in.

I recall how she slid from between my thighs. Emerging out of fertile depths into sterile light—a brush of moth wings on my face in the darkness.

We watch from the kitchen window, as their kin steal straw from inside the chicken coop. Somehow the birds manage to keep up a momentum between flurries. Food. Shelter.

People here shoot starlings. I can’t imagine being angry over these little thefts. I doubt they’ve ever listened to such vital songs.

‘There. Can you hear it?’ I ask my daughter.

She sits on the bench, eyes closed, head tilted, legs still.

‘Yes Mum,’ she whispers, ‘I’m up there on the branches too.’

I follow her finger outside, through horizontal rain, to the tree.

 

*Author Note: Previously published with AdHoc Fiction 2016.