What I Want to Believe About the Vireos
— Catherine Pierce
“I have no idea why vireos are doing well,” Dr. Rosenberg said. “I’d love to do a study of vireos and discover what their secret is.”
— The New York Times, ‘Birds Are Vanishing From North America’
The vireos are plotting.
They are everywhere and various
and all with names
like Shakespearean villains
disguised as Shakespearean clowns.
Black-whiskered.
Plumbeous. Slaty-capped
shrike. Their songs drop
from the canopy like candied
needles, and everyone smiles. Sweet
birds. They’ve been above us
for centuries, watching. See
their eyes: small, bright
pebbles that betray
nothing. They know
patience. See them tableau’d
on the oak branch
for minutes before diving
for the fat black beetle.
They know how green works,
how it muscles back, always,
once the pillars and poisons
are gone. They’re playing
the long game. Weary,
weary, weary, trills the scrub
greenlet. It’ll all be theirs
again—rain forests, mangroves,
the great deciduous rustle.
The breeze and moss.
The loam and sunrise.
The vireos will be here
at the end and at the next
beginning. The red-eyed
vireo’s call will sound then
like it does now, like
it’s constantly asking
and answering
its own questions.
What did they do?
They did.
What did they know?
They knew.