Common Birds XXVIII - Red-Shouldered Hawk
Thursday, May 18
It feels mythic. Perhaps it is, the era of myths being not a fixed point in the past, but a quality of time in which the past and future are drawn into and magnify the present.
I am crossing a bridge. Below, the creek runs slowly but clear. Above, a host of leaves diffuse the sharp lines of the sun, wrapping me in shadowless light. A hawk alights in the railing of the bridge, twenty feet to my left, and I recognize the hawk. I saw it a few weeks ago, standing by the steam. At the time I couldn’t identify it, but I’ve studied the picture I took of this hawk. I know it now. It is an immature red-shouldered hawk. Hints of orange-red are just now peaking through its cream colored breast feathers. He lifts his right leg, flashing his talons, and scratches his hooked beak along its scaled shin. Robins shout and swoop trying to drive off the unmoved hunter. Suddenly, he stares at me. Two searching, golden eyes meet two, searching blue eyes. I walk closer, ten feet. The hawk is fearless. For a time we stand together, breathing the same morning air. Then, a flash of wings and the hawk dives into the creek’s gully, and is gone.
I have to resist the temptation to fall under the hawk’s spell. My goal is to celebrate common, unnoticed birds. But this hawk draws me, because unlike those ordinary birds, he has a face like mine. Robins, wrens, nuthatches, almost all birds, have one eye on either side of their heads. Then they look at me, they look sideways. Only one eye is directed towards me. When the red-shouldered hawk looks at me, he looks like me. Both eyes pointed out of the front of his head, beak like a sharp nose. From under his brow, two eyes with golden irises face me. Perhaps this is why I strike fear into the hearts of birds and beasts. When they see my face, they see the face of a raptor. This likeness of likeness makes it effortless to project onto this hawk. My automatic mechanisms for inferring mind, emotions, and humanity from eyes like mine fly into action the instant the hawks gaze connects with mine. I feel that we are alike, ranging over these woods with eager eyes.
If this is a myth, what does it mean? This is the beauty of myth: it is meaningful. How should I read this omen? What are the tidings of this winged messenger? Am I about to cross, irrevocably, a threshold? I wrote this only half seriously, but, yes. I am poised on one side of a chasm. In less than two months, my son will be born. I’m not sure what my life will be like then, but I know it will not be my normal pattern of existence. Watch. Watch this time with eager eyes, for soon the bridge will be crossed, and you will find yourself back in ordinary time.
