February 2022
Bio Note: Can’t help it, I’m drawn to mountains and a more hardscrabble way of life. I grew up in Maryland at the foot of Appalachian ridges, spent summers in the Adirondack Mountains of upstate New York. Now I live in the Santa Cruz Mountains of California among birds and redwoods and the occasional lion.
Call of Nature
We’re in bed when to our ears huh-hoo, hoo, hoo breaks the silent night. Distant among the oaks, great horned owls call, respond, then harmonize a duet—an art, no accident, constant adjustment by minds with intent. Side by side we lie. Playfully I call to you huh-hoo and you respond to me hoo-hoo, our harmony rougher, less practiced. Suddenly from nearby they respond: Huh-huh-huh-huh hoo, hoo, hoo. You laugh, we embrace, bed creaks. Then silence. We spooked them. In darkness face to face we wait. Scarcely breathe. No sound. Perhaps, like us, together they press. Perhaps they nest. After minutes, softly from outside: Huh-hoo. Huh-hoo, hoo, hoo. Voices mix, girl and boy, for harmony, for joy.
Originally published in Blue Heron Review
©2022 Joe Cottonwood
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