Yank-Yank the Nuthatch

White-breasted Nuthatch, Sitta carolinensis,
known as Yank-Yank the Nuthatch by Thornton W. Burgess

If wishing makes it so, I’d like a nuthatch.

We search for things every day--each of us.
If you work in a library, those things are books. Not found on the shelf where they belong, perhaps moved a place or two to the left or right, or carried some distance away.
Often, still there, but hidden.
We cannot find them.

So, the question rebounds to me--the cataloger. Who, with every addition to the library’s collection, handles, opens, browses, peruses…describes—
then, lovingly passes each on…to the shelf.
In the process, learning each well--its color, size, distinct markings…
and remembering its image--
that saved impression against which to match the search.
Because when you know what you’re looking for,
finding it becomes easy.

So, too, I find it is with the birds.
A jumble of forms in a guide, page after page, side by side--of all colors, shapes and sizes. So numerous, that when looking at just one upon a branch--a small, feathered thing, the flood of possibilities soon feels like a tidal wave.

But if I take just one,
and set it apart from the rest--
lovingly turning it over and over,
discovering what describes it,
I find finding it—
easy.

Somewhere out there, is a nuthatch—
A Red-breasted, feathered thing, smaller than the White-breasted so often seen. With a black eye-stripe and white brow, but buffy orange below.
A visitor from the north woods, wintering more south—
like the Sapsucker I hoped to see, and found!

Waiting for a nuthatch—
if wishing makes it so.

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