Dangling Crow

 Overnight frost – the first of the year, here in Lichfield – and looking out at the garden this morning, I saw something I'd read about but never actually seen before: a crow was hanging upside down, wings folded, from the end of a thin twiggy branch, low down in the big ash tree. At first I thought that something was wrong, but the bird soon dropped to the ground – and a minute later it was up in the tree again, making its way down the same branch, to hang there again. This is surely play – even science acknowledges that crows, rooks and ravens engage in behaviour that can only be classified as play, another example being rooks' displays of crazy free-fall flight, known as 'whiffling'. Magpies, however, don't seem so keen: my crow was all the time being watched by a scolding, agitated magpie who didn't seem to approve at all. After a couple more upside-down hangs, my crow flew off and went about its business of the day. Once again I feel an irresistible urge to quote Kay Ryan's definitive crow poem, 'Felix Crow' –

Crow school

is basic and

short as a rule—

just the rudiments

of quid pro crow

for most students.

Then each lives out

his unenlightened

span, adding his

bit of blight

to the collected

history of pushing out

the sweeter species;

briefly swaggering the

swagger of his

aggravating ancestors

down my street.

And every time

I like him

when we meet.