This isn't that great a photo. I have been lucky enough to take better ones of the Coucal (crow pheasant) incidentally the bird that is also the logo of my publishing house, Coucal Books.
But this photograph to a certain extent illustrates what makes it so tough to photography this amazingly shy, suspicious and reclusive bird.
For the rest of the mystique of the experience, there is this poem (first draft, and untitled, as of now) as well.
As if it has heard a rustle
from the laboured focus of my gaze;
the Coucal traipses off, again
In an ungainly, tail-heavy tiptoe
up through tree storeys
all russet stealth, a streaky
Rust and black shadow of light
a poem shying away, alarmed
into the wordless escape of flight,
Gone, again.
Somewhere in the lush foliage of poems that is Ink Dries, there is one that is on the Coucal's predilection to slink away. But this one has a individuality entirely of its own and a big dose of immediacy as well.
P.S. No, I did not type it up in my cellphone (shudder shudder). And I do hope I do not end up losing this blog as well.
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