A parliament of rooks, a murmuration of starlings ...

I often look out the window of the book lined snug - I put down a feverish novella, to see blackbirds questing for worms - these elegant murderers prowl in wary zig zags across the lawn - sharp yellow beaks stab into the soft earth -

Jay once told me how he'd seen a murmuration of starlings - I whispered the strange lovely word - I pictured the swirling unsettling shape, low in a darkening sky -

Walking with Penny, south of Affpuddle, I saw a parliament of rooks - we were heading towards some pine woods - the icy rain had eased -

I stared at the gathering birds, listening to their urgent cries - they wheeled as one over the empty fields - I felt suddenly afraid, as though I was fleeing the morthbrood -

Once under the cover of the tall pines, I felt safe from ancient eyes -I thought of Coleridge - he'd looked out of the window of the London coach at dawn - starlings in vast flights drove along like smoke, mist - some moments glimmering and shivering - now thickening, deepening, blackening -

Holmes writes that this image is one of shifting energy and imagination -

I wanted to know the meaning of those subtle, shifting, patterns in the sky -