Jenny Debell

This morning during my run, a couple of my favorite birds were performing in their preferred Carnegie Halls: one was balanced on the front and center tip of a roof, a glorious songbird, unnamed (my young student defines glorious as 'great x 2'), and a shadowy woodpecker was in full throttle over at the peony church. It's kind of amazing that creatures so small carry voices so large. Think about it.

I sat on the porch afterward and read, Back to the World, and listened to the riot going on in the trees behind me. I just imagined what was happening. The squirrels are feisty little witches, like, who else would fight over a twig? The birds make the tree tops their rush hour blitz, the equivalent of coffee, getting the kids up, brushing teeth, finding junior's favorite jeans, scarfing a Poptart, and making the bus on time. Because it's silent again by 8.

Then the dogs come out to pee, bark, sniff, yell, mark their territory like it's some manufactured international border, count their bones and put them back in their wallets, and then their hiding places (like I can't see), shoot me the evil eye, and then just like that, shit in public.