Brown Honeyeaters

By Helen Hagemann

A brilliant blue rising from a bronze morning

and Brown Honeyeaters are circling the garden.

Today, they are in the olive tree in my neighbour’s

yard, performing aerial songs (although it’s more a short

sharp, tweep!). Before spring, I counted two regular

visitors to our horticulture of Canna lilies, Yellow

Bird-of-Paradise, Grevillea, Frangipani, now there are

four! As if in concert, they dance, plunging to and fro.

It’s balletic, reminding you of Rudolf Nureyev and Dame

Margot Fontein in Romeo and Juliet. One of the

fledgelings is as graceful as Maria Kochetkova, a

Giselle fluttering her wings, thin as the veil of a tutu.

There’s fussing from parents, followed by a preen on

brick wall and hedge, a bird commotion of tutelage.

The best is their closeness, high in the branches, and now

that the young are fed and sleepy, the show has stopped.