Superb Fairy Wren
By Tim Slade
There’s a wren inside the car!
This morning I hand-delivered your mate,
painted blue upon a Welcome Home card.
​
A heart flutters... For Chris’s dying return,
morsels of food from my cupboard —
and the paper wren.
​
I search your bright eyes: intelligence.
A vital life. Quivering wings —
hop-hop you go along the dashboard, tense...
​
Dear wren — fallen leaves of autumn —
Chris hasn’t noticed you — nor has his dear wife —
even their adoring dog is solemn.
​
My instinct is to usher you on.
I offer my left palm: touch-and-go wings
you fly away, unharmed, towards a freedom...
​
I have never heard you say a lie:
your everyday song. At the last —
a freed bird is my goodbye.
Tim Slade is a poet from Lutruwita / Tasmania. Tim’s poems are widely published and broadcast, including for the ABC’s Radio National, Australian Poetry Anthology, Island, The Weekend Australian, Cordite Poetry Review, Dada Muse, and the Margaret Reid International Poetry Prize. The Walnut Tree (2021, Bright South) was longlisted for the Tim Thorne Prize for Poetry, as part of the 2022 Tasmanian Literary Awards. Tim’s forthcoming collection of poems is The Wave of Life. Tim's website is tim-slade.jimdosite.com