Thursday, November 17, 2016

Birds of the Quarry, 4 - The Cormorant


Turbulent times prompt a cormorant to still waters at Halibut Point.


Immigrants of various races gather in sanctuary. The cormorant stands on immense incongruous feet. 


It's adaptation to deep diving comes at the expense of buoyancy and waterproofing. The cormorant comes ashore periodically to dry its wings to stay afloat. Those wings beat laboriously to keep it in the air unlike the soaring gull. Its dense leg musculature excels on the chase but burdens its flight.


Nevertheless it flies. It out-swims fish under water then takes to the air.


It maintains a regal posture at the edge of the quarry as it does along the rocky ocean shoreline.


On land it appears more wistful than saturnine.



 

Its flight may be termed expedient but it does transcend distance and gravity. It strains to work itself up off the water. It launches easily from a promontory.


To look steadily at a cormorant is to see the embodiment of a hunter in its niche.
 

It looks back through a wary turquoise eye, holding the secrets of its sovereignty below the surface.

No comments:

Post a Comment