Bird Watching

She looks through the lens, a Baltimore Oriole had just flared into orange sherbet, but now there was her wide-eyed grin filling every space left over. Once as a young man, I dated a sweet girl. I called her my ‘yellow ducky’ but even her comical loveliness had only filled my arms and private parts, but my head remained stuffed full of a teenage kapok. Watching golden eagles, my long lens growing heavy as I scan the sky for the false gold in their plumage. We used to call females ‘chic’s.’ As a kid, I had to wear huge, round, corrective glasses I was known as ‘owl’ boy. The Baltimore Oriel is back, it alights on a branch just above you, blooming again in a frizzle of colors; you are unaware and keep smiling into the camera. My head is a fizz of euphoria. I bless Baltimore, for being that golden city in the clouds that I always thought it was.