But even a romantic poet needs a fine eye for detail and a complete set of sensibilities in order to make true art out of his heart’s yearnings.  I was not happy with the piece as it was and so turned back to it, hoping to re-discover within its body the true form that needed to be chiselled out from its original, crude, form.  Set out immediately below is the updated version:

Crimson Rosella

We were taking our baby for a drive – he needed the movement in order to fall asleep – on the outskirts of Stanthorpe, the small, rural town where we live, when suddenly a pair of crimson rosellas flew straight in front of the car.  I was driving and I did not see them until it was too late.  The front right of the 4wd had already struck the first of the pair before I had time to react – in fact, the only reaction I had time to make was to check the rear vision mirror.  What I would see left a mark on me, and for better or worse, that is what I want here to record.  The lead bird had indeed been struck heavily and was thrashing around on the road in what was obviously hideous pain.  I stopped the car to turn around to go back for it; I needed to help, in whatever way I could and I figured a vet may have been able to do something for the little bird flailing about on the bush bitumen.  My partner had missed the worst of the accident – from her angle in the passenger’s seat, she had not seen a thing until I winced at the moment of impact, obvious enough to tell her that the car had just struck a bird.  She was calm and patient and allowed me to go back for the bird.  However, by the time I had turned the car, driven back to the fateful place and parked safely on the side of the road, the bird was no longer moving.  I can’t remember whether I felt relief – that its pain was gone – or sadness, that a life had been lost.  It must have been the latter, for as I got out of the car and approached the bird, a giant empathy crept up on me that forced horrendous tears from my eyes.  The bird was indeed dead, a little blood marking its beak and eye.  I gently scooped the body up and placed it gracefully in the bush, off the road so that it might decay respectfully and not be trodden on again by modern life.  The sadness that ran my body was strong, the empathy for the mate of the bird, still watching from a nearby tree, the needless death of this beautiful animal; I broke as I stumbled back to the car.  I couldn’t drive for some time.  My partner offered to drive but I said I would be ok.  Some more tears fell on the steering wheel before I was able to compose myself enough to get back on the road.  Such powerful emotions may have no obvious source, but as I sit here recounting the event, there is yet a darkness in my heart and a heaviness on my mind.  Death can do that.

What you’ll notice has changed is the excising of many of the uses of the first-person ‘I’.  This pronoun has its place in literature, but over-use just reads adolescent.  And so several instances of its use had to go.  Next was the final sentence.  The original phrasing was a little too obvious, condescending even.  I replaced that with a more nonchalant vibe, adding more edge to the work.  Anything overly sentimental reads as just rubbish.  The section around the vet has been altered as well.  I really didn’t like the way I had originally phrased it; the reader doesn’t know the vet, he or she is simply ‘a’ vet as far as the reader should be concerned.  Editing – it’s the way you really learn how to write.  Never have anyone else edit your work – you need to do it in order to work towards gaining a full command of your craft.  how can you hone your sensibilities if someone else is enacting theirs on your work!

Eileen is the author of the latest release in our Poetry Series, Mama Joy.