Steller’s Jay

I saw a bird today
and marveled at my luck…
For a moment and not a second more
It flitted through the walnut trees
the way jays do
And left me with a thought or two.

It made me think of another jay
or, rather, a pair
That haunted a wood at the end of a lane
So far from here,
So  long ago
…if a year makes it so.

— Oregon, 1977