Small birds are somehow always in the mall.
The stately, doméd food-court is their hall and tiny sky.
Tad, the tall, bald man is flustered by their dives,
Perturbed, trying to wind down with fries and coke.
“Incoming!” his mind cries.
They’ve flown by before he jolts,
Curses, blushes, feels shame for such a chicken flinch.
Just thrushes, sparrows. Some kind of finch? Who knows,
Who cares what make or model of bird lives there
In the eves above the columnd gates of Sears.
Birds of the food-court.
Birds of the mall.
Tiny, spiraling, dry tears of grey and brown.
Tad wishes for a mop or broom
To swat them down.
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TaleWeaver the author’s storytelling, writing and creativity book/game, at www.lulu.com/awhavens
Blog is at www.TinkerX.com
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You have written a poem depicting the grief of one who is fed up with the unwelcomed birds at Sears. A picture stands out in my mind of the scene after reading it twice. I appreciated reading it. Thanks.
The White Marsh Poet
I was going to say how much I liked the imagery, but I wasn’t sure that that’s what the poem was about, so I searched for clues.
The only two other things I’ve ever heard referred to as being “stately” are Kubla Kahn’s pleasure dome, and Wayne Manor.
Now, the parallel between this piece and Kubla Kahn is obviously the dome, though I’m not entirely certain that a food court could be considered “pleasurable.” Tasty? Certainly. A brief respite? Definitely. But not pleasurable. One could also draw connections between the “damsel with a dulcimer” and the everpresent Mall Muzak…but let’s not.
The biggest drawback to equating these two works is the inconvenient fact that Kubla Kahn has no birds in it. I thought it did at first, but had misread “thresher’s” as “thrushes”. One presumes that Coleridge was poised to populate his poem with all manner of avian wonders until interrupted by the famous knock at the door.
That leaves the Batman canon. When we begin to examine all that makes up this beloved vigilante, we are immediately struck by the presence of the character of Robin. A Robin! A small bird! Truly this has to be what Stucco Thicket is about. Tad is obviously Alfred, who is constantly distressed by the exploits of his charge. Then again, Alfred would never dine on something as bland as “fries and coke”, so perhaps Tad is actually the Joker. On reflection, this makes more sense, given that the final line expresses Tad’s (the Joker’s) wish to swat the birds out of the sky (our heroes). I’m not so sure that I would have tried to stretch the definition of bird to include a flying mammal, but that is your prerogative as the author.
I liked what the poem was about.
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