Robyn Detterline

The First Checklist

Humboldt Park, Chicago, Cook County, Illinois, US 
Thu Feb 01, 2018 8:21 AM 
Protocol: Traveling 
Party Size: 1 
Duration: 40 minute(s) 
Distance: 1.2 mile(s) 

6 species total:
150 Canada Goose 
8 Mallard 
1 Red-tailed Hawk 
10 Rock Pigeon (Feral Pigeon)  
2 American Crow 
1 Northern Cardinal

One hundred fifty Canada geese float in my blood. They know something about the cold and constrict the vessel-ways behind their saunter at the slightest sign of bitterness.

A disease is a disease because it has no reason.  
A disease with reason is no disease at all. 

Blood geese are excuseless, and lazy, and thick in freeze they stubbornly stay. Then why do they shrink the arteries, an overreaction to winter, an allergy to Februariness. Where did they learn this animosity of wing. 

Perhaps they wish to be a secret hawk, discovered only at the very end,  
when life has already shifted to waiting. 

Yet the hawk preys upon rats, 
​and has a red tail.

My fingers turn pearly, and my toes. 
When the blood rushes back after some warming, the skin is a rustic magenta,  
and sometimes 
deep 
juicy 
purple.

It is a disgusting thing.

Drab geese, drab. 
Blacks and ecrus and poop dirt. 
It is possible that in the blank stare lies a more intelligent shyness.  
It is possible that in my disease the geese find the vivid splashes they crave. 

The day is cold and getting colder, and when the fowl tuck head under wing, do they dream dark dreams of spring. 

Birds are a syndrome, and sometimes  
I forget geese fly,  
although they do it every day. 

The Thirteenth Checklist

Backyard, Chicago, Cook County, Illinois, US 
Tue Feb 13, 2018 10:03 AM 
Protocol: Stationary 
Party Size: 1 
Duration: 10 minute(s)

1 species total:
1 White-throated Sparrow 

          A white-throat 
seeps 
          lonely 
          in a ghostly shrub 
seep 
          and I tell her 
          for me she can 
seep 
          a tag-along 
          with nowhere to tag 
seep 
          tag-along tag 
          onto me 
seep 
          finally freed 
          from the foreign flocks 
seep 
          still confronting 
          in cloudy stillness 
seep 
          whether she be 
          a suitable friend 
seep 
          of the sparrow 
          inside her own head 
seep 
          A lonesome 
          white-throat 
seep 
          I am too sad 
          to leave 
seep 
          so I’m happy 
          ​when she
​
          leaves me 

The Forty-first Checklist

Backyard, Chicago, Cook County, Illinois, US 
Tue Mar 13, 2018 7:38 AM 
Protocol: Stationary 
Party Size: 1 
Duration: 12 minute(s) 

7 species total:
1 Black-capped Chickadee 
1 European Starling 
1 Dark-eyed Junco 
1 White-throated Sparrow 
2 Northern Cardinal 
2 House Finch 
11 House Sparrow

a chickadee, a junco, and a cardinal ​

walk into a joke ​

until house sparrows ruin the punchline: ​

all winter long all ​

a white-throat ​

winter long all winter
​long all winter long 

is

all
winter
​long

among them

in the spring he will disappear ​

into a window his brain ​

will collide with his skull ​

and slowly bleed and ​

squeeze itself ​

and die

for now here’s a riddle: ​

I pluck dropped seeds  ​

from the soil ​

and the bugs who  ​

came up too soon ​

The Fifty-first Checklist

Backyard, Chicago, Cook County, Illinois, US
​Fri Mar 23, 2018 9:35 AM 
Protocol: Stationary 
Party Size: 1 
Duration: 13 minute(s)

7 species total: 
1 American Robin  
1 European Starling  
6 House Finch 
1 Dark-eyed Junco 
1 White-throated Sparrow 
2 Northern Cardinal 
14 House Sparrow 

When I reach the seam of my pockets, 
and the end of a rented porch, 

will the sparrows splay for me  
their small, germane moments, 

and will I discover them  
​before the squirrels. 

The Fifty-seventh Checklist

Backyard, Chicago, Cook County, Illinois, US 
Thu Mar 29, 2018 9:20 AM 
Protocol: Stationary 
Party Size: 1 
Duration: 12 minute(s)

4 species total: 
7 European Starling 
4 House Finch 
1 Dark-eyed Junco 
12 House Sparrow 

I am mindful that 
the sparrows sulk in the shrub 
praying for the return 
of their old bread life 

I am mindful that  
the cardinals not here today 
think kindly of change 
always taking advantage 

I am mindful that 
the junco unjustly tethered  
to non-native grass 
is only one and leaving

I am mindful that  
the white-throat may be 
for days foraging another yard and 
is dead or dead to me 

I am mindful that 
the finches do nothing wrong 
yet still zip a weird zip 
sounding an awful lot like the end 

Robyn Detterline

Robyn Detterline is a writer, editor, and educator. She volunteers with Chicago Bird Collision Monitors, an organization that rescues wild birds injured by window collisions. In an effort to manage anxiety and depression, she participated in a checklist-a-day challenge, in which she made daily observations of birds for one year, writing a poem for each checklist.