Wily fraudster of the thicket,
feathered minstrel of the garden.
The mimic master of pilfered music,
the avian clown brings joy
with echo of tunes, not owning.
What can she do, it's 12am:
a dripping faucet, ticking clocks,
mockingbirds mimicking crickets.
An elephant never forgets
these things and all that she regrets:
mockingbirds mimicking crickets,
a dripping faucet, ticking clocks --
What can she do? It's 12am.
[An Octo]
You Think A Bird Brain
Is As Stupid As You!
All The Mocking Is
Sweet Music Ours...
You: Less Than...
Why Can't You Fly?
Hey! I Could!
See The Jet Filled With Humans!?
I Could Be In That One, Easy!
Yeah, Right, Without All The Help,
Fly On Your Own... Do Your Best...
Do You Have The Recipe, And
All Of The Ingredients?
Quack Quack, No I Can't
Even Sing (Dimensionless...)
Why Don’t You Have Feathers?
You Bozo Hanging T-Shirts
To Hang In The Naked Hot Air?
I Have Textiles, And Freedoms
I Can Wear With My Moods...
I'm Not Limited By One
Living Beautiful Radiant Sheen...
You Are Just Living On The Fruits
Of Numb-Skulls Numb'er Than You...
The "Skill" Of Conforming...
From Your Collaborationist Culture...
Dumb As It Comes!
Hey! Why So Melodic...
But So Harsh!? I Adapt...
On The Good Will Of Ever-More
Strangers.
********************************
Free As Feathers
Catching A Whim
A-lighting From A
Breeze...
-Gray Squirrel
06-03-2026
Autumn wings grace the stout limbs,
That quiver with the perching
Of mimicking mockingbirds.
Amid a lone live oak tree,
A bachelor sings to its
Intended in an endless
Ebony Garden of stars.
Wily fraudster of thicket,
O mimic master, you‘re deft.
Proud of every pilfered note,
avian clown, you bring joy
with echoed tunes, not owning.
Feathered minstrel of garden,
you allure with borrowed hymn.
Written: October 16, 2025, for contest sponsored by: Nette Onclaud
***********
Oh, mockingbird, stout and bright,
You weave the dawn with delight.
Each gray song is clean and free,
Tree's symphony—life's decree.
Without means or crowd, you sing—
A voice that molds hush to cling,
Life bard with feathery grace.
MockingBird
Always Teasing
"Effing - Effing - Effing - What?"
A Gray And White Kite
Needing A Little Mate
She's Music & I'm Just Grunts
She's Always Flirting...
(MayBe Male?)
Who Cares...
See You Later, Love.
***
The Jaybirds Were Wrong
Give Me a Peanut!
It Wasn't Them.
I Was Wrong
I'm Not Perfect
"They Always Think It's Them!"
I Said
Worse Than Selfish.
***
Wildebeest (Or Flocks Of Geese?)
Several Simply: River Flotsam
Please Save Me!
Every Living Face Returns
The Same Inquisitive Look
Millions, Billions,
Dillions, Zillions.
Crossing Rivers Massively...
Here Or In The Past:
Who Gnu?
***
Mourning Doves
In Plaintive Sorrow
Moaning, Mourning
Please Have Mercy...
They Try,
But Cannot Scream.
FLAP FLAP FLAPPING
I Saw It. I Promise.
***
I'm Not A Real Squirrel
Alive Or Dead
But All These Ghosts...
But All These Ghosts
Have A Little Spectral
Corruption
And AN Imaginary Head.
-Gray Squirrel
05-22-2025
Do believe the truth we tell you
Don't believe your lying eyes
Say the mocking birds now calling
Filling these dark gaslit skies
While the children all around us
Reaching up with open arms
Wonder if we’ll protect them or
Leave them to a world that harms
As this force of darkest evil
Winks within us as we sleep
Leading our minds into chaos
Dawn will free us from the deep
(11/3/24)
a mockingbird chose
church yard tree to build a nest....
swooping, pulling hair
congregation said
someone needs to get him tamed....
now priest flies in
A melodious tune in the morning
Floating in the morning breeze
An artist on the stage
The genius of the skies
Day by day the sound drifts through our doors
Orchestrated by an all knowing creator
The heavenly acapella
A wonder to behold
Till I heard the voice no more
Waited in vain for weeks
Why is the artist away
Was all I could say
Then I heard it again
Voice strained as it sang
Eyes hung as it wallows in isolation
The mocking bird in it's cage
"Mockingbird"
What sayst thou?
Now, here you sit and I speak to you
through strange keys revolutionary,
poetry what is thy purpose for? A mirror wall?
Where visions unseen speak and reply contritely
black and white pedestrians robed in all their colours
walking now through their other realms?
“sometime too hot the eye of heaven shines,
and often is his gold complexion dimm’d;
and every fair from fair sometimes declines,
by chance or nature’s changing course untrimm’d;”
nightingales and mockingbirds all feathery poets in night-flight quilled
Nightingale, Nightingale thy eternal summer shall not fade, nor fail,
shining loudly, blessed revelry held in the loving hearts of pages whispering,
“Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May” …
(LadyLabyrinth / 2023)
mockingbird sits
ruffled feathers in mid-june ....
contemplating
To land a mockingbird,
sent out an innocent cat;
one that wouldn’t eat a bird
if it was starving.
A mockingbird’s greatest fear,
hatchlings being eaten
by a feline foe.
I had a tabby who never bothered a bird;
he only dined from cans.
One day a mockingbird nest
fell from a tree,
it’s eggs broken and soaking
into the sun-warmed ground.
Like feline, greased-lightening,
my baby was being dive-bombed
by mocking birds from both sides;
his tail pecked to the bare bone,
I cleaned and bandaged it.
For weeks I had to carry him to and
from his box so he could
answer nature’s call.
A cat with a bandaged butt,
has no pride left.
Yes, if you want to land a mockingbird,
send out an innocent cat;
they’re waiting...
Ye cursed with too much knowledge,
all fate’s within your grasp
The destiny of all beguiled
entrenched behind your mask
To Thee of grace outstanding,
the rose and bud the same
Beginnings end as endings start
assumptions die unclaimed
Oh Ye who brave the mountain,
its winds blow far and chill
Each footstep placed a sin erased
the moment frozen still
And Ye who share the journey,
all mockingbird’s deboned
Your wisdom marks a trail unseen
—for others to atone
(Las Vegas Airport: July, 2022)
Mockingbird
I watched a mockingbird build its nest this beautiful spring morning in June.
A soft flowing breeze drifts with scents of orange blossoms and honeysuckle.
Twig by twig – winding, twisting, weaving a tiny bowl of beauty.
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