Poems by Jessie Laurel Benjamin

Dear Bob

by Jessie Laurel Benjamin

From Canary Summer 2018

Jessie lives on the Piedmont plateau in southeastern Pennsylvania in the Eastern deciduous forest. Her home is in the historic Brandywine river valley adjacent to a meandering creek and her neighbors are the oaks, hickories and ash trees, as well as numerous winged and four-legged friends.

Crickets are humming. The Katydids stopped singing hours ago, and the Cicadas have yet to begin. As I open my eyes in the dark, the musty smell of early morning greets me as it drifts in through the window. The haze of sleep slowly retreats. I think of Bob. He’s probably still sleeping. Padding in bare feet, I feed the dogs, make a cup of tea and amble onto the front porch to watch the sunrise. Good morning, Morning. The wind is moving through the trees, branches are swaying, twigs are clapping, the water garden splashes, a blue jay squawks and a tufted titmouse calls “research, research.” Many sounds, but no Bob.

I go for a walk and hear the ominous “kee-auh” of the red- shouldered hawk that does nothing to quiet a mounting sense of unease. I worry - will this be that day? And I realize I have fallen hopelessly in love – with a bird. This love story began a few months ago, while meeting a friend for a walk at a local nature preserve. Pulling into the parking lot, I hear with stunning clarity “bob-WHITE, bob-WHITE.” Geez it’s been decades since I’ve heard one of those. I step out of my car and greet my friend Sue just as the brown-headed bird with a white throat and black eye stripe swoops down from its perch in the black walnut tree, lands in the gravel parking lot and marches up to us. He boldly looks us in the eye, opens his mouth and roars, bob-WHITE, bob-WHITE! Completely charmed, all we can do is laugh. We watch him for a while as he pecks at seed, jumps on the post and rail fence, calls again at full volume, then slowly meanders down the long lane like a kid kicking stones. There is a swinging, rocking motion to his walk and his head bobs side to side. The sight is both comical and disquieting. Why is he alone?

Except when they are nesting, bob white quail stay together in covies of twelve or so and, if the habitat is supportive, they rarely range more than one quarter of a mile. At night, they roost on the ground, banding together in a circle where each bird faces outward like soldiers manning their posts, protecting one another from harm and sharing their warmth on cold winter nights. Am I seeing the last bob white quail – like Martha (named after Martha Washington), the last remaining passenger pigeon who died in 1914 at the Cincinnati Zoo, a bird so rare her body was immediately frozen and shipped to the Smithsonian?

In southeastern Pennsylvania bob-white quail are not yet extinct, but they are as rare as the native grasslands where they nest. Tall bunch-forming grasses like the tawny broom sedge, the golden panicled Indian grass and the erect stems of little bluestems provide adequate cover, yet enable the quail to move through the fields while masking them from the soaring sky hunters – hawks and owls. The native bunch grasses have been replaced by sod-forming grasses introduced from Europe and Asia that preclude ease of movement, particularly for young chicks.

Chances are this bird is not wild, so who released him? Was it the Pennsylvania Game Commission or a hunter looking to train his retrievers? Maybe a school teacher who purchased quail eggs for a school project, each selling on-line for 99 cents. The students incubate the eggs, and the bird, no longer useful, is then set free by the teacher. But the quail is left to find his way in the wild: clueless, unprepared and without the support of his covey. These scenarios are disturbing. I contact the preserve manager to see if he knows anything about the re-introduction of bob white quail to the preserve. He doesn’t but surmises that a local landowner is responsible. He thinks it’s cool; I’m not sure. With few remaining hedgerows and brushy thickets, will they be able to escape the hungry fox or hawk? Will they find a safe place to nest that is away from the mowers used to cut the fields for hay before the nesting season ends?

* * *

Six weeks after we encountered the bob white at the nature preserve, while walking down the road from my home I hear through what sounds like a microphone, “bob-WHITE.” You’ve got to be kidding! I turn around and walk back toward the nearest tree, saying “Hey you,” and with that the bird with the scaly brown-white dappled plumage and barrel chest takes off, air moving through his wings like a muted whistle, lands within ten feet and saunters right up to me. Thrilled, I stay to watch him for a while, all the while wondering, What’s up with these birds already; it can’t possibly be the same one? That evening he sits in our neighbor’s spruce tree, calling like a blaring trumpet. My husband goes to investigate; our bird-loving neighbor comes to see what is going on. Then Bob joins us in the garden, pecking at yellow violet seeds, making funny cooing sounds. We watch him explore the garden, pecking here, pecking there, looking quite at home among the sedges and ferns. Towards dusk, he lifts off in heavy flight into the woods.

This is the summer of home renovation and there are a lot of workmen around. For a couple of weeks, there is a continuous call and response of bob-WHITE!” until I can no longer discern the difference between the human calling and the bird calling. Carpenters, electricians, plumbers – they all sing along with Bob, who is unflustered by the whack, whack, whack of hammers, the sharp buzz of saws, the thundering and vibrating boom of the generator; Bob enjoys being amid the fray, the more noise the better. One afternoon while I am walking around the yard and talking to Sue on the phone, Bob rounds the corner and nearly bumps into me. I say to Sue, “Bob says Hi.” He greets Richard in the garage and is rewarded with a handful of sunflower seeds, which he eats from his hand. On Monday mornings, the workmen arrive whistling, “bob-WHITE.” This friendly big-mouthed bird spreads an infectious joy wherever he goes.

* * *

It has been two weeks since I have heard Bob’s call. He has moved on, taking the active wonder of his presence with him, leaving only a sweet memory of a bird that came to visit, sang his song, was sung to, and then was missed beyond reason. I imagine Bob on a cold and starry night standing in a blanket of broom sedge with his covey; wing to wing, feather to feather, they share warmth and protection, Bob's eyes open and watchful.