Through a Cloud
I was riding east on a nameless country road. Wind at my back gently nudging me along. Nothing much to see on either side ‘cept stubble fields. Combines had combed the terrain just days ago.
Nothing much to see else this undulating ribbon of weathered asphalt bisecting endless brown with a few scattered shards of corn leaf offering modest punctuation. Except...a bit farther ahead...I noticed incongruous deep pools of ebony hugging this ribbon of mine. My eyes were never all that discerning to begin with and they’d certainly not improved with age. I was puzzled by what I saw.
Pedals twirling, zephyrs laughing, I arrived soon enough at the shore of this black sea. The entire mass began to vibrate, then levitate. Starlings! Countless bodies rising, wings beating in eerie silence.
I was engulfed in a cloud of feathers. Momentarily lost in motion and black, unable to see even a foot in front of me. Birds literally brushed against my arms and legs in the midst of this ebon fog.
It’s a glorious thing, this business of flying blind through a starling cloud.
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posted by Jonas | 10/28/2010 08:18:00 PM
8 Comments:
That is sooooo cool, Jonas! And being on a bike meant you could sneak up on them and experience that. Wow.... just... WOW!!!
Oh Jonas. At first glance I thought Locusts. So glad I was wrong. What a moment, like the eye of a hurricane made of down. Amazing gift!
Check this out Jonas.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XH-groCeKbE
Oh, holy holy, you wrote it so fricken well, Jonas, I was there with you and I am grateful for it. What a moment!
xo
erin
Totally amazing experience. You were so in the right place at the right time. Maybe this means you are in a flow with the world around you.
Hi Jonas,
I always like what I find here. Is that an actual picture of what you saw? It could be comething out of a S.King novel. Spooky. Birds seem to flock more intensely with the onset of winter. Do you notice that? It sounds like you were riding down our road, surrounded by stubble fields, and I love "combines had combed the terrain". Starlings are my least favorite bird but you've made them intriguing.
I am terrified of birds. I think I would have died.
Ah, Dear Readers, you all so GET IT!
Yes, this was one of those "brushes with Nature" that will stay with me as long as my synapses keep firing and my dendrites stay awake. It was an amazing experience. And, yes, Ponita, I felt the WOW!
I've been blessed, Annie. Many times and in many ways.
Cool video. Lilith! While the starlings in my neck o' the fields aren't quite as numerous, there are plenty enough. More than enough to take my breath away.
Thank you, Erin. Coming from a writer/poet adept as you, that's high praise indeed.
I hope so, June. I feel myself healing. Feather tips are powerful medicine.
I'm sorry, Yvonne, but I steal images from the Internet shamelessly. Still...the images capture what I see and feel. In case you missed it, I’ve written about a starling before. You can read about this miracle here.
I understand you, Anna. I'm ambivalent about birds, meself, those inscrutable feathered dinosaurs. Even so, souls that can't be readily anthropomorphized intrigue me the most.
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