Well, I had think about this. What do I know about that is worthy and dignified? Not much. Do I have a high enough level of emotion, and imagination? Lyrically addressing something/someone - what, who? My textbook says they are meant to read aloud. Gosh, so much expectation. I will just throw caution to the winds.
And yes, I'm late with these last two. Too bad.
To a High Flyer
My chirpy friend, your urgent voice
at first concerns, then I rejoice!
It's you, it's you, oh feathered one
patterned with bars of golden sun
and black as if singed by summer fire
and yet your voice is a veritable choir.
Urgent, you chirp, and swoop for gnat
Is this your greeting? Have you seen a cat?
Another swoop under the shade cloth's cream.
creating a debt I'll never redeem.
As fast as you hunt and eat what you catch
I'm too humanly slow to be any match.
You dash, my friend, to higher perches
your days spent in these frenetic searches
for supremely delicate morsels too slow
to escape your arrowed flight, and shadow.
I stop my work, enthralled as you call
and amaze at the way you triumphantly trawl.
Yet you care not; what should I expect?
No more than those unfortunate insects
whose lives are short and shorter still
because you harvest, eat your fill.
You're not an especially social creature
are you, my sunny honeyeater?
That's enough of that one.
The last prompt: "after leaving here".
We Drove To The Transfer Station
We Used To Call A "Tip".
It took much less time
and muscle to unload
the ute, roll the old carpets
out
into the skip and watch
the weeds tumble
from green tough bags.
And not one scratch!
Not one peevish last
thorn
or redback unhappy
at the enforced migration.
We slapped our mitts
together, happily
well rid of
such rubbish.
