Forest Life

Unmistakably, they are there, we 
know because they are not shy about
pealing out their triumphalist cries
deep in the autumn woods, the
bluejays en route to the boreal forest
to overwinter there, and the giant
primitive Pileated woodpecker whose
lunatic call is challenged in hair
prickling sound only by the loon
and the screech owl. The bluejay
flitters ghostlike through the trees
divesting themselves of colourful
foliage to bedeck the forest floor with
a confetti of crackling shades exuding
the acrid odour of tannin enriching
the soil below with a thick humus
for the future, year on year. The
hammer head of the woodpecker
echoes a well-timed metronome
regulating its blows to extract the
delectable larvae of tree-destroying
insects. Gusts of wind urge foliage
still cradled on tree limbs to drift
through the crisp atmosphere fulfilling
the secondary function that nature has
in her estimable wisdom decreed.