When my interest in birds had moved  

from burden to obsession 

I sought comfort in the supernatural –  

                     the way, for example 

white netting flows and settles over  

fruit trees at dusk, or how a spill of light  

from the zinc factory goes  

                  from lilac to deep tissue bruising  

on the wall. Tonight, as I raised  

the netting to free a silvereye  

whose wings were caught in the mesh 

                      a blue-faced honeyeater  

arrived in a flurry of song  

to harvest a berry cluster  

from a palm.