Torpor and a Little Mystery.

The night walks are a bit flat at the moment. I suppose it’s because the flora is all slumbering – the trees, the hedgerows, the wild flowers, even the grass on the fields – and so there’s no energy to feel. It’s a bit like walking through a dormitory at night when all the inmates are asleep.

It won’t stop me going out, of course. There’s still the sky to look at, the dog foxes and owls to hear, and the little people to sing to. I just hope my dissonant crooning doesn’t disturb the birds which must be sleeping somewhere.

I’ve always wondered where the birds go to sleep. In the hedgerows and trees, I expect, where they can’t be seen. And I’ve always wondered where they go to die. How often do you see a dead bird unless it’s a road kill or the victim of a domestic cat? Maybe they die at night when it’s cold, and fall to the hedge bottom where they rot away or get eaten by small scavengers. It’s what I imagined happened to my friendly robin that hung around me for three years. He disappeared as usual late one summer and never came back. And I often wonder how many of the robins currently in the garden are his children who were raised on the oats he used to ask me for. Life passes.