Earlier this week I walked in Magnuson Park and observed this White-Crowned Sparrow hopping along a path. It reminded me of a beautiful Emily Dickinson poem: A Bird Came Down the Walk. In the poem some lines reveal how closely she looked at natural subjects, and other lines display her untethered imagination, as free as any bird in flight. I am quoting a few selected lines here.
...He glanced with rapid eyes
That hurried all around--
They looked like frightened Beads, I thought--
He stirred his Velvet Head
Like one in danger, Cautious,
I offered him a Crumb
And he unrolled his feathers
And rowed him softer home--
Than Oars divide the Ocean,
Too silver for a seam--
Or Butterflies, off Banks of Noon
Leap, plashless as they swim.
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