As you have gathered, I love wildlife refuges and birding. One of my all-time favorite places to go is the Ridgefield National Wildlife Refuge. Because it is close to my home, I go there often. Today the weather was changeable and the rain discouraged me from painting, but I was thrilled to go to the Refuge.
How different it is for me to go to a park where for a quarter, anyone can buy a sack of breadcrumbs and seed and the once-wild birds come close to the sack-holders in an unnatural way.
Birds in the Park
Natural caution lost
you pursue grain filled hands
lazy, survival sure
and greed
I walk among you
whispering fly north
to the Wildlife Refuge
where you can live secure and free
Ignorance is taking comfort
in captivity and bondage
calling it a good life.
