Roost

By the spinney gate
under the old hornbeam
in the deepening gloom
it is the time of day
for the jackdaws to arrive
at the city in the rafters
of vaulting, unclothed
beech and sycamore.

It starts, a rumour
of airborne legions
marching home on
stygian cloud trails
distant chatter, carried
on February’s chill
from the gathering place
then multiplies
folding the air
till a glorious din
dense, voluminous
causes the very chest cavity
to throb to the echo
ears are stopped, and
faces crease with gladness.

Time, through the lens
of memory, foreshortens.
A snapshot is filed.

A calm descends
as black clans in silhouette
clothe the trees’ nakedness
and the babble ebbs
to isolated exchanges
above the muttered rumble
of the earthbound
metalled, human road
across the fields

then flows again
as, with a clarion cheer
high-pitched, with
incongruous bass notes
the dark helix heaves
upward, pauses, poised
then settles again, finally
under night’s blanket.