Common Birds XXIII - Warbling Vireo

Monday, May 8

Everyone is happy and singing by the pond, and why not! It’s sunny, sixty-five degrees, all the trees are blossoming, and all of this is a gift. I should be singing, too. Instead, I listen and love. As I walked towards the pond from the stream, passing mother robin on her nest, I heard the song of the warbling vireo. It took me straight back to the banks of the Raquette River in Potsdam, NY. Exactly a year ago, I was looking for my current job. My wife and I were driving for my in-person interview from the vireo filled woods of the North Country to this place of ducks, waders, and warblers. There are still vireos, but they’re not the ever present soundscape as they are north of the Adirondacks. Driving down for the interview, I never imagined I could be so blessed at work by this pond and all its inhabitants. 

The song of the warbling vireo sounds a little like the cries of the original Pokémon. They’re trying to sound organic, but they don’t have the bits required to have the smooth transitions of real birdsongs. For warbling vireos, this is not a limitation of their hardware, but a problem with my perception. Warbling vireos sing smoothly, but they change pitch too quickly to follow, so I hear something that sounds remarkably digital. They’re small birds, yellowish-green colored with slightly darker backs than fronts. In the wild, they look exactly like new leaves, perched high in the canopy. Trying to see them usually involves staring at a singing tree and waiting for one of the leaves to detach and flutter to another branch.

As I stand by the pond, I pray I can write with the same clarity, precision, and openness with which the birds around me sing. Every time they lift up their voices they tell me exactly who they are, where they are, where their attention is, and nothing more.