No, it’s actually a bird called a winter wren. I think that’s what I saw and heard. The image, if you click on it, is a link you can follow to see the actual bird.
Oh yes, thank you! I didn’t notice that link. I just thought that the song resembles that of the robin that sometimes sings outside my bedroom window, sitting in the still naked ash tree. Then I read that you don’t have what we Europeans call a “red robin” on the other side of the Atlantic. Good poem, very exact picture!
But we do have Robins here! Lots and lots and lots of them! Can’t imagine where you read that. Interestingly, my mother just visited me from Germany. She had never seen a Robin! That left me with the impression that Europeans don’t have Robins?
Confusion because of language – “my” robin is a Erithacus rubecula or European robin and it has never crossed the Atlantic. Your robin in New England is a Turdus migratorius or American robin. And they are not even related, have different song but look similar. (I didn’t know this, had to look it up) So when I read on Swedish sites about the “Rödhake” (= European robin) I found that it doesn’t live in America.
In other words, the robins of Emily Dickinson and John Webster were not the same kind of bird …
Your mother could not find a Turdus migratorius in Germany.
On the other hand, the winter wren, I just learnt, is one of the very few species that we have both in Europe and North America!
Thank you for a very interesting, inspiring and entertaining site!
Excellent poem. The winter wren song is one of my absolute favorites. They only established a breeding presence here in ’93, after a big storm brought down 100+ trees across our creek. We enjoy bringing this example up whenever some forester starts talking about the benefits of “salvage logging.” Troglodytes troglodytes isn’t happy without a little darkness.
I had never heard it until I wrote this. There was a thread bare sapling along a barbed wire fence with a 20 acre meadow behind it. All alone. That was when I heard the wren. Wow! A huge song from such a tiny little song! It was like the whole tree lit up with music.
PoemShape 
perfect and beautiful…
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there’s so much in these few words… excellent
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Dalloway & Polona,
You’re own steadfast writing of haikus is what inspires me.
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Beautiful, thank you! The bird, is it a robin?
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No, it’s actually a bird called a winter wren. I think that’s what I saw and heard. The image, if you click on it, is a link you can follow to see the actual bird.
LikeLike
Oh yes, thank you! I didn’t notice that link. I just thought that the song resembles that of the robin that sometimes sings outside my bedroom window, sitting in the still naked ash tree. Then I read that you don’t have what we Europeans call a “red robin” on the other side of the Atlantic. Good poem, very exact picture!
LikeLike
But we do have Robins here! Lots and lots and lots of them! Can’t imagine where you read that. Interestingly, my mother just visited me from Germany. She had never seen a Robin! That left me with the impression that Europeans don’t have Robins?
LikeLike
Confusion because of language – “my” robin is a Erithacus rubecula or European robin and it has never crossed the Atlantic. Your robin in New England is a Turdus migratorius or American robin. And they are not even related, have different song but look similar. (I didn’t know this, had to look it up) So when I read on Swedish sites about the “Rödhake” (= European robin) I found that it doesn’t live in America.
Links for listening to them:
American robin: http://www.naturesound.com/birds/audio/robin.ram
European robin: http://www.sr.se/p2/p2pippi/sounds/pip0504.ram
In other words, the robins of Emily Dickinson and John Webster were not the same kind of bird …
Your mother could not find a Turdus migratorius in Germany.
On the other hand, the winter wren, I just learnt, is one of the very few species that we have both in Europe and North America!
Thank you for a very interesting, inspiring and entertaining site!
LikeLike
Excellent poem. The winter wren song is one of my absolute favorites. They only established a breeding presence here in ’93, after a big storm brought down 100+ trees across our creek. We enjoy bringing this example up whenever some forester starts talking about the benefits of “salvage logging.” Troglodytes troglodytes isn’t happy without a little darkness.
LikeLike
I had never heard it until I wrote this. There was a thread bare sapling along a barbed wire fence with a 20 acre meadow behind it. All alone. That was when I heard the wren. Wow! A huge song from such a tiny little song! It was like the whole tree lit up with music.
LikeLike