Snowbirds

October 1, 1984

Very little can be said about snowbirds. They find their way, flying thousands of miles from Central America to Arctic beaches where they move as fragile wedges across the twenty-four hour skies. Left to right, they color the summer nights gray against the strangely light blue sky, right to left, they fan out white. These small, fat sparrows from the south are the only birds I hear here. There are no trees, no fields of flowers, nothing but ice, the cold bluewater sky, and snowbirds.