Mother's Day Special Feature by the Editor

Mother’s Day Haiku

Steven Wittenberg Gordon

on the nest

your eggs incubated

by your warmth

hatchlings cry for food

open mouths yawn before you

you feel their hunger

flying lessons

you must teach them to take wing

even if they fall

no longer hatchlings

mouths open wings aflutter

you feed them one last time

hardest part of all

you turn your head ignoring them

watch them fly away

Editor's Note:  Every spring I enjoy observing the juvenile forms of my backyard birds along with their adult parents.  One mark of a juv, other than slightly smaller size and immature coloration, is the rapid fluttering of wings and open mouthed pleading to be fed by the mother bird (or sometimes the father bird).  At first, the mothers cannot resist the cries of their young, but as spring turns to summer eventually the cries are ignored.  The young birds then learn to fend for themselves--the ultimate mark of having been successfully mothered.