by Cecil Morris
When hobbyist photographer Michael Sanchez snapped this picture of a blue rock-thrush subspecies on the coast of northern Oregon last week, he didn't know how rare the bird was until he posted it to social media: a blue rock-thrush, far from its native breeding habitat in parts of Europe, Africa and Asia. —NPR, May 3, 2024
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The blue rock-thrush, bewildered, finds itself on an Oregon beach blown thousands of miles east from its Asian land, its native air, the green greens of home, the known, familiar browns, the sunset skies. Here the seagulls speak an angry foreign tongue, a forbidding scream, and it’s just another vagrant, one more illegal immigrant someplace it doesn’t belong and, maybe, looking for a home.
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Cecil Morris taught high school English for 37 years. Now retired, he spends his time writing poems and shaking his head at the news. He has poems in or forthcoming from Cimarron Review, Hole in the Head Review, The New Verse News, Rust + Moth, Sugar House Review, Willawaw Journal, and other literary magazines.
Terrific poem. I envy the photographer, and I also envy you for making this poem.
Beautiful bird beautiful poem