Burrowing Owl

The crows were crowing. A storm of crows gathering over the cottonwood trees next to the pond, and even the two resident mallards were joining in, as the trees filled with outraged birds.

It wasn’t about food, although they tend to fight over dinner.

I look into the trees and I see a smallish owl sitting on a branch looking all sleepy, rousted in the daylight by the vigilante crows. I am surprised to see this little owl so off course. It shouldn’t be here, in the downtown eastside. It should be on a farm hunting field mice, living in an abandoned barn. It is another world away from this urban place.

The owl is all pulled into itself and I can’t stand to watch. Normally I love crows but some things make them unreasonable. Bigoted, I guess. The ducks didn’t much like the owl either. I shoo the crows away, inadvertently startling the owl and they all fly away. The crows in hot pursuit.

I read the owls future in the sky. Hunted, with no place to alight, it will fly until exhausted and then it will fall out of the sky.