Talking to Toads

I confess.
It’s true.

I talk to the toads.
Not that I go looking for conversation.
But often, as I scuffle hoe the garden,
a modest size clump of soil
will suddenly take up animation
and leap off to one side.
“Well, hello there! I see you now.”
“It’s OK.”

In return, the toad blink’s it’s eyes.
Sitting just out of the path
of on-coming destruction.
Waiting patiently
for this current scuffle to pass.
Uninterested in projecting the future?
Simply unperturbed by the present?
“What’s the latest, Toad?”

“My, you’re looking well fed.”
Toad blinks one eye.
“The green beans are nice this season,
don’t you think?”
No response.
Green beans are apparently
not in the toad lexicon.
“How much longer until our annual plague
of beetles arrive?”
Toad blinks both eyes and scrunches down
to be a little more compact,
a little more like
a modest size clump of soil.
In a bit of shade under the giant leaf
of the green bean tree
that shall not be named.
“Mind the hoe!”

I confess.
It’s true.

I talk to the birds.
I will go looking for conversation.
Into the garden to wait
for a new song or old.
The Carolina wren perched on the post
yodeling over and over
in brave defiance of fate.
“Hey there, Wren. Lovely evening.”
“It’s OK.”

This summer a red eyed vireo
built its nest 30 feet up in a tree,
level with the Adirondack chair
on the deck of the human house.
“Well, greetings! I see you now.”
“What a beautiful nest!.”

An intricate basket nest,
hung between the dividing
branches of a beech tree.
Woven tight to protect
and withstand the winds
and rains of the next few weeks.
Swinging in the breeze.
“Can I offer you some mosquitoes?”
“Welcome to the woods!”

The words are opaque to the vireo,
I imagine, opaque for the toad.
The toad is a mystery.
But the vireo is more clever than I,
who could never weave a nest
30 feet in the air
with just a pair of pliers
and the woods for raw materials.
Who could never make my own way
back to Appalachia
from a winter in South America
to build a nest in the vireo’s backyard.

But in antiquity we shared
a common ancestor,
the vireo, the toad, and I.
A relative relying on the nature
of vibrations in air,
on conversations in the broad sense.
I owe them that conversation.
Perhaps they reach some sense
of who I am from my sound.

I confess.
It’s true.

I talk to the deer.
In a manner of speaking.
I talk to the deer
like the crazed grouchy old man
standing outside in his pajamas
and bare feet
waving a rake and screaming,
“Get the hell off my lawn!”

Deer eat anything and everything.
Within the fencing of my garden,
whole galaxies of wild flowers live.
Outside, in deer country,
they were long ago exterminated
by the antlered rats.
Deer would eat the side of a barn
if it were the only thing standing.

As I approach waving a bucket,
the only thing near at hand,
the deer just stand there staring,
perplexed,
as if they had never seen this before
on a daily basis.
Eventually one will become nervous
and stamp the ground.
“Ha! Too late, you bug-eyed,
myopic, dumbass bastards!”
“You’ve all been shot!”
Another will finally snort the alarm.
And they bolt for the woods
like drunken jack rabbits,
white tails mocking surrender.
“I’ll give you $10 each
to go play in the street!”

It’s true.
I confess.