Parlement of birds

Parlement of Birds

for my mother

Cacophony, noisy as the squawk and yawp

of boys let out of school

with the rude laughter of kookaburras;

the miners scream, friar birds cluck and gobble,

black cockatoos yacker and squall for rain,

at early dawn the wattle bird –

coo-cackle, coo-cackle, coo-cackle.

Underneath, a ground swell of warblers and pardelotes,

the chink of bellbirds,

Jacky Winters, Willy wagtails,

a rufous whistler dribbling notes

over a cool fall of pebbles,

cut by the brain-fever bird’s ascending cry

koel?

Hot noon, the burr, the chirr and whirr

of scissor grinders grating,

the evening skirl of plovers,

and in the coral trees the lorikeets

racket and jabber for food –

as each day brightens the currawong shouts,

Elohim! Elohim! Elohim!