Compassion, Spring 2024

16 tcf.org.uk My Birder This time I saw him at my shoulder, bent part forward, intent on what he saw. His face was framed by his usual mane, his shaggy beard, intent on what he saw. The eyes were clear, no worry lines betrayed his face, just intent on what he saw. Was he intent on what I was writing before commenting on what he saw? Was he interested in the poem I was penning in my half sleep - a usual remedy for insomnia near the dawn - or did I see him just intent on what he saw? He may have expressed a passing interest, picked out a word to check its derivation, or how it was an answer to his clue - the final one, ten across, in the Press. More likely, he’d spied the Tree Creeper as it skips round the trunk of the apple at the bottom of our garden. A young one with a downy breast, the small sharp beak, and the mannerisms of its parent higher up, on a nearby sycamore. Likely that he already knew where they rested, could show me where their nest is. Water Shortage If the Water Board could capture all my tears that flow with the dawn, wring out the sodden tissues and so refill reservoirs to overflowing. If they could follow behind me, perhaps with a bib contraption Invented by Heath Robinson, as I listen to the morning chorus. If they could harvest all this water, and do something with the salt, it would solve so many problems since I am not able to stop crying. 'My Birder’ by Richard Carpenter - 2 poems The poems in this book, ‘My Birder’ written by Richard Carpenter came out of the raw grief that followed his son Nicholas’ death in a road traffic accident while monitoring the dwindling population of rare willow-tits near their home. Nicholas was a birder, a lover of cats, wildlife and nature. COMPASSION | YOUR STORIES & POEMS