four and twenty

four and twenty blackbirds, scattered around my yard, on the eaves of my house. it's raining and cold, and still they're here, out of season, out of climate, populizing urban areas that have little to offer them.

i would tell myself that it's because i'm a little bit Raven, but who isn't? in that case, then, i suppose my blood is simply poisoned, such that i rattle off tales and rattle off tails until i forget that all this time, i was supposed to be carrying the sun. and there it goes again, plummetting to the earth until that mangy dog takes up with it again, holding it in his mouth while he chases after his own tail. and all you children, they'll teach you in school that Raven is always a little too busy singing and telling stories to ever really appreciate the truth. but the thing is, baby, we don't do anything BUT tell the truth, and sometimes that pisses people off. like that mangy dog down there. how long you think before he starts some fuss about how he's too dignified to chase his own tail, how he's smarter than that? but every story we got, even when there ain't nobody around to hear it. it's the truth.

and if you're listening in, then i guess maybe it's a truth you're itchin' to hear.

so i walk out into that yard, thinking of that nursery rhyme about that old white king who thought that some scrawny corvidae made for good afternoon snacking, and i laugh, the sound sending my black-winged brothers into the sky. i can be cruel, without a doubt. sometimes i can sense weakness, can smell it on the wind long before it drags itself into town, tail between its legs, and some little switch in my brain switches or something, and it's like i'm out to search and destroy. but these little black brothers of mine, they're anything but weak. you never know when a pissed off blackbird's going to remember you down the road and peck your nose.

fact is, spend all your time collecting stories and then sharing them, and you find yourself knowing some pretty good roosts, annoyingly strong.