Sandhill Cranes,
hundreds per flock,
fix their wide wings
in a stalling descent,
a controlled falling to earth.
They're gliding into
Bosque del Apache
National Wildlife Refuge
in New Mexico.
Yodeling their calls,
ruffling and preening
their feathers.
These muttering multitudes
creating a cacophony of sound.
A popular place to overwinter
until their spring departure.
© 2025 Richard Havenga
Sometimes, the words
flying around inside my brain,
are like a massing flock of blackbirds;
swooping, looping, dipping, dropping,
landing in the crowns
of leafless trees.
How do they not collide?
At other times the words
organize themselves;
seem to have a direction
and purpose,
flying in an orderly allignment,
like the neatly arranged chevron
of Canada Geese,
or Sandhill Cranes,
that know where they're going
and how to get there.
© 2025 Richard Havenga
Photo Locations:
1. 2. & 3. San Pedro River - Sierra Vista, Arizona
4, Home Skies - Cannonsburg, Michigan
In this forgotten cropfield
that once grew soybeans,
it's a day in late winter,
still below freezing,
with a trace of snow remaining.
Sandhill Cranes toss stems and leaves.
With the slightest wing thrust
they rise effortlessly
eight feet up, then settle down
like winter angels.
They dance and call
and flare their wings
and toss and dance
and wait for spring.
© 2025 Richard Havenga
Photo Location: Home Fields - Cannonsburg, Michigan
He sat close to the window;
writing, and watching summer mature.
As the Ruby-throated Hummingbirds
zipped and sipped at the feeders and flowers.
And the Sandhill Cranes
yodeled from nearby wetlands.
As the White Water Lilies
floated their purity upon the lake.
And White-tailed Deer raised
another generation of fawns.
As wheat, stretching straight and tall,
ripened green to gold in dense rows.
And fireflies flashed green-yellow lights
in the silky dusk of evening.
As frequent thundershowers
kept the heartland green.
And the window to his world offered
daily scenes of summer theatre.
© 2024 Richard Havenga
Photo Locations:
1. Home Feeders
2. McCarthy Lake
3. McCarthy Lake
4. Home Fields
5. Home Fields
6. Home Woods
7. Home Fields
Thousands of Sandhill Cranes call
and fall from the blue New Mexico sky.
With their wings held in stutter-flight,
coasting, braking, decelerating,
the cranes fall to earth, descend
into a great cacophony of sound.
A commotion of feathers
and feet on the ground.
© 2024 Richard Havenga
Photo Locations:
1. 2. 3. 4. 5. Bosque del Apache National Wildlife Refuge - New Mexico
How could these Sandhill Cranes
ever realize the admiration
I have for their elegant grace
while flying through sky-blue sky
with their wingtips curved up,
feathering the golden air of autumn?
© 2023 Richard Havenga
Photo Locations:
1. & 2. Bosque del Apache National Wildlife Refuge - Arizona
Birds fly
with a dependable rhythm.
They trust
the thrust of their wings.
Have faith
in their fine feathers.
Move with
conviction and grace.
Know how to ride the wind,
sail the transparent air.
Beyond the sublime,
toward the divine.
© 2023 Richard Havenga
Photo Locations:
1. 2. Bosque del Apache National Wildlife Refuge
3. Home Sky - Kent County - Michigan
Whenever a quick,
silent shadow sweeps
over the ground around me,
I immediately look up
toward the sun,
to find the shadow's source.
Was it a Turkey Vulture,
Red-tailed Hawk,
or Sandhill Crane?
A Canada Goose, of course,
would announce its arrival
before it arrived.
This time a large surprise:
a Bald Eagle carving easy circles
between sun and clouds.
Silent shadows
sweeping the earth,
far below the source.
© 2022 Richard Havenga
Photo Locations:
1. & 3. Home Fields - Cannonsburg, Michigan
2. Home Woods - Cannonsburg, Michigan
4. Pickerel Lake Park - Fred Meijer Nature Preserve - Kent County - Michigan
5. Eagle Lakes Park - Naples, Florida
Blue Jays, quiet and secretive
most of the summer,
have begun to shriek and jeer
from high hidden perches.
Black-capped Chickadees
gather in groups again
to chatter and jabber:
"fee-bee," and "fee-bee-bee".
Eastern Chipmunks jump
and scatter quickly
off the wooded trail
you are hiking.
Sandhill Cranes have raised
their young and take them up
for practice flights, preparing
for late fall migration.
And out West, in the elevations,
the Rocky Mountains are already aflame
with Aspens climbing and
spreading gold up the slopes.
© 2021 Richard Havenga
Photo Locations:
1. Home Woods - Cannonsburg, Michigan
2. Chief Hazy Cloud Park - Kent County - Michigan
3. Pickerel Lake Park - Fred Meijer Nature Preserve - Kent County - Michigan
4. McCarthy Lake - Grattan Township - Kent County - Michigan
5. Grand Mesa National Forest - Colorado
how much we long for
the grace we see in the flight
of these Sandhill Cranes
© 2021 Richard Havenga
Photo Locations:
Bosque del Apache - National Wildlife Refuge - San Antonio, New Mexico
