The Cardinal

My son’s visitor leaves a “gift”

The Cardinal Bird
(William Davis Gallagher, 1808-1894)

A day and then a week passed by:
The redbird hanging from the sill
Sang not; and all were wondering why
It was so still—
When one bright morning, loud and clear,
Its whistle smote my drowsy ear,
Ten times repeated, till the sound
Filled every echoing niche around;
And all things earliest loved by me,
The bird, the brook, the flower, the tree,
Came back again, as thus I heard
The cardinal bird.

William Davis Gallagher grew up roving the Ohio River valley and writing nature poetry. (Click the title to read the entire poem.)

I probably write way too much about birds. I love wild birds and have wild stories to share! I do hope you enjoy this one:

My son lives in a rural area of Wisconsin in a historical farmhouse. Built in 1857, he works at renovating this wonderful old building a little at a time. He is not a farmer, though his neighbors are, and he loves seeing the patchwork of neatly planted crops that spread across the vast acreage adjacent to his property. This pastoral scene is visible from his second-floor bedroom window, and he leaves the screenless windows open so he can better survey the panorama of the countryside.

Close by in a beautiful, mature tree, a single brilliant red cardinal regularly perches right where my son can see him. Being a smart bird, Mr. Cardinal likes being admired and proudly displays his bright feathers. He knows this will pay off when the observant human leaves him food.

One warm morning, after my son had gone to work, the cardinal ate all the food left for him and decided to investigate another nest—the one on the other side of the invitingly open window, where every day he observed the human observing him.

The high ceilings in the quiet old house must have been very exciting for the daring, scarlet bird as he investigated strange objects and marked each one with a splotch of—well, you know what—and then moved on to the next.

When my son returned from work, Mr. Cardinal had already checked out via the window, but not before leaving his large special mark on everything he had explored (the TV, the lamps, bed, furniture, floor, etc.). Now, he sat on his eye-level perch, looking ever handsome and ever innocent, crimson wings demurely tucked, watching the man on the other side of the window shaking his head and loudly grumbling something about getting screens!

Do you suppose the adventurous Mr. Cardinal thought he was leaving thank-you “gifts” for the kind human who feeds him?

By Gael Stuart
The Silver Sage Blog