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PENGUIN MACHO FOR SILVIA
For two months in the black Antarctic night,
the Emperor stands still above the egg
that is his sole concern; his movements slight,
he warms in it the pouch above his leg
against the dark and metal-splitting chill
of polar winter; there he holds, erect,
unheeding hunger, as the ice-shelf's shrill
cold-razored winds slash him to no effect.
One wonders if, throughout his frigid stand,
he dreams of northward, light-danced seas his mate
drives through to feed and flourish far from land.
No matter--_here_ he keeps his watch in state.
The Southern Cross moves round the ice's rim;
there are still weeks until its stars grow dim.
Nelson Miller
There is nothing in which the birds differ more from man than the way in which they can build and yet leave a landscape as it was before.
~ Robert Lynd
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The shape of a bird's beak directly corresponds to the type of diet it eats in the wild.
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