This is how I see it

Black throated pied butcher bird
picking up sticks
sees bicyclist
Pied strikes like a drone in Yemen
2 metre tall cyclist
Takes refuge
under Poinciana
Juveniles join in
Kamakase air raids
triangular strafing with clapping beaks
30 centimetre birds can cower a man

Takes off helmet to expose every grey hair
now sitting on dew covered grass
afraid to leave or to shout out
Raid after raid comes in and then…

Two women with pram appear
on Milne Lane

Beautiful pink baby inside sucking buttons of shirt,
Grey-hair tells them of attacks,
One woman, the mother’s mate,
says how territorial butcher birds are

Shared millisecond of concern
by all three for pink baby
blinking in morning sunlight
Mother and friend confident birds will give pram right of passage
down Parooba Avenue

Grey-hair takes flight down the road
only to come across an old lady on the path
who admonishes him
saying “Should you be on this path?… Go to Article