AUTUMN HERON This morning a strange heron hung motionless from a blueberry ash in the garden. Angular, its eye was staring downward, its belly and tail still. An upper wing was hooked nonchalantly over a branch, the other stretched below. I almost held my

AUTUMN HERON

This morning a strange heron
hung motionless from
a blueberry ash in the garden.

Angular, its eye
was staring downward,
its belly and tail still.

An upper wing was hooked
nonchalantly over a branch,
the other stretched below.

I almost held my breath
in case it drew itself
together and flapped away.

No. Just a stray twist of bark,
fallen from the eucalypt above,
that the sun had scribbled with shadows.